


On the Slip Side

by proser132



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Aster owns a flower shop, Clubbing, Human AU, M/M, Nick is very loud, Sandy is very sensible, Tooth is very fashionable, playlists included for your listening pleasure, psychological romance, touch of surrealism, what even is this AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-01
Updated: 2016-09-04
Packaged: 2018-08-12 11:19:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 29,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7932670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/proser132/pseuds/proser132
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'You should be dancing, looking like that.'<br/>'Looking like what?' Aster replied, thrown off-guard by the abrupt address.<br/>The bloke's smile grew; it was a nice smile, if youthful and toothy, and sat pleasantly beneath a cute nose and a pair of blue eyes that were bright as electricity. 'Like that,' he replied. 'You know -' he made a lazy up and down sweeping gesture with his free hand as the barkeep passed him and nodded without saying a word. 'Gorgeous.'</p><p>Aster does not want to go on this three day club venture, courtesy of one Priya 'Tooth' Bharandi. He likes his life just fine, thanks ever so, and does not need his friends' meddling. He wants no part, no thank you.<br/>Too bad a part wants him.</p><p>Three-shot with epilogue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Thursday.

**Author's Note:**

> http://8tracks.com/proser132/thursday-slip-side

'No, are ye daft?'

Tooth scowled. 'Why not, Bunny? It'll be just like old times!'

'Old times are old because they've  _ passed, _ Tooth,' Aster replied, returning to stocking the azalea arrangements in the freezer block. 'We’re way too old for an all nighter at a club, much less three in a row.'

'You're thirty-one, you're not old.'

'Old enough to know better.

She crossed her arms, looking dreadfully put out. 'Come on, Aster,' she pled; Aster ignored her, because she only used his actual name when she knew she was losing, and was trying to gain the advantage of sounding authoritative. It had never once worked, but her hope was unwavering. 'How are you ever going to meet someone if all you do is work and stay at home?'   


Aster snorted. 'The only people I'll meet if we go clubbing, Tooth, are people who have IDs older than they are.' He closed the freezer door and stood up from his crouch, dusting his hands off before putting them on his hips. 'I dunno why ye're so set on this. I  _ like _ me life, I like me shop and I like me home.'   


'That's not what Nick says,' she said slyly, and Aster grimaced.   


'I go out for drinks one time, get a bit maudlin, and suddenly everyone's a matchmaker,' he muttered, then sighed at her look. 'Tooth. I'm not going clubbing with ye and Nick. It's just not happening. 'Sides, May is around the corner, and ye know what that means. Proms and weddings.'   


'It's  _ the ninth of April, _ Bunny!' she exclaimed, frustrated. 'Valentine's  _ and _ Easter are past, and you know you have some free time right now!'   


'I don't want to go, Tooth,' he said mulishly, and she threw her hands into the air.   


'You never want to go anywhere anymore!' she snapped. 'Ever! Not the bar, not a concert, not even the damn bookstore! You'd think you were sixty one, not thirty one!’ She sighed and leaned on the register counter, giant violet eyes turned on him pleadingly. Her and her bloody coloured lenses; at least she’d finally settled on one colour. ‘What happened to you, Bunny? In college, you were the life of the party. What happened to charming, funny Aster, huh?'   


'He grew up and opened a flower shop,' Aster replied with a quirked eyebrow, neither offended nor impressed by her tirade.   


She sighed again. 'I didn't want to have to resort to this,' she said, and Aster tensed as she pulled out her phone, flipping it open and hitting a number for speed dial.   


'Hi, Sandy?' she said as the other end picked up, and Aster groaned. 'I'm calling in that favour. Yes, he's refused. Yes. Yes. No, that tact didn't work. Yes, Nick's an idiot. I know. Right. Tonight, nine o'clock, my place. Wear something other than yellow for once, dear. No, I take it back. Just wear something else, too. Yes. Yes. Love you too, you nutjob. I'll tell him. Yes.' She closed the phone with a click, ending the call, and flashed Aster a brilliant, victorious smile. 'Sandy sends his love.'   


'Why would ye do that?' Aster sighed, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. 'He hated clubs even when we were young enough to enjoy them. Can barely hear him as it is, much less with yer eardrums blown.'   


'Because he's worried about you, too,' she said matter-of-factly. 'You need to get out more, meet more people -'   


'Why are ye on about that?' Aster demanded. 'Ye three are all single, too!'   


'But we date people, Bunny. And Nick's been getting serious about Natalia, you know that.'   


Aster blinked. 'I thought they broke up.' He’d been disappointed to hear it; he’d really thought they were the ones who’d make it, too.   


'That was three days ago, for a total of an hour, because she ate the last freezer pop and Nick is overdramatic but lacks resolve.'   


Against his will, Aster chuckled. 'So that's what it was all about. Glad to hear that got cleared up.'   


'And for the record,' Tooth sniffed, 'I  _ am _ seeing someone.'   


Aster's brows crept up towards his hairline. 'Since when?' he asked suspiciously, beginning to fiddle with the ribbons and wrapping papers near the register.   


'I've been keeping it quiet.'   


'Ye couldn't keep a graveyard quiet,' Aster retorted, and Tooth laughed loudly. 'Seriously, what's his name?'   


'You know, everyone says that,' Tooth mused. 'It's like everyone forgets I play both sides of the fence.'   


Aster blinked. 'Well, yer last ten boyfriends sort of threw me off,' he admitted. 'Sorry, s'rude of me to assume.'   


'It's okay, Bunny,' she said, patting his hand. 'And maybe you'll meet them tonight!'   


'Them?'   


'You’ll just have to see,' Tooth winked. 'It's a surprise! Don’t worry,’ she said, presumably at whatever face Aster was making (he’d bet a whole prom centerpiece that it was at the very least unimpressed.) ‘They’re wonderful. They’re one of the good ones.’   


'I'd never dare assume different with anyone ye dated,' Aster said kindly; as a general rule, she did tend to date good people, even if it didn’t work out in the end. Then he frowned. 'Well,

except Phil.'   


'Yeah, that's fair,' she nodded. 'Now, what are you wearing tonight?'   


Aster groaned. 'Clothes, presumably, but ye never know. Might go starkers and show up the same.'

Tooth laughed again. 'My place, nine o'clock, bells on,' she said, leaning on the counter.   


'No bells. Maybe a whistle,' he said, just to make her laugh once more. 'Now, shoo, or ye'll scare away me customers.'   


Tooth gave an unimpressed look to the empty shop and began to say something just as the door opened, and a gaggle of teenagers came bounding in. She sighed. 'Fine, but don't be a flake!'

'Ye got it, Tooth,' he said reluctantly, and waved her off.

From what he could glean from the chatter, one of the teenagers (might be closer to college age, maybe even a little older, he really couldn’t tell) was going on a Very Important Date. Capitals and all. They’d all tagged along to help pick out the appropriate bouquet for such a momentous event. It was sort of like watching a bunch of parrots, what with the ridiculous array of hair colours - neon green, pastel blue locs, red and gold wrapped braids, brilliant pink, a black that looked remarkably unnatural, and a lovingly done sunset gradient that Aster had to admit was impressive. He suspected the other two, hoods pulled up and chatting to each other, likely had similarly coloured hair that was just hidden for the moment. He himself had gone grey prematurely, by which he meant he found one grey hair when he was twenty four and decided to just dye his entire head grey in response.

The teenagers-young-adults-whatever they were had no idea what they were doing, but cheerfully and politely refused when Aster offered to help, saying they wanted to pick the flowers themselves. Aster, because he really was a prick at heart, didn’t bother to mention to them that the orange lilies they were cooing over meant ‘hatred’ in most flower languages. Likely that their date wouldn’t know, either, and it was no skin off Aster’s nose if they bodged up their own date because they didn’t bother to read the placard attached to the damn bucket.

For his own part, he just waited for them to make their selection, wondering idly what on earth he was going to do for tonight. He didn’t own any clubbing clothes, for true, and in all honesty didn’t particularly want to. If it couldn’t hide a dirt stain, he didn’t tend to bother. Besides, he had no idea what people even wore to the kinds of clubs Tooth was bound to drag them to - places with techno beats he didn’t know and didn’t enjoy, bouncing and headache-inducing light shows, and filled with people Aster had no intention of hooking up with.

He’d never been the hook up type, so honestly, he had no idea what Tooth’s angle was. He was hardly going to find a steady date who had anything in common with him at a bloody night club.

‘Excuse me, sir?’ One of the teenagers said, the heavyset girl with pink hair the colour of Pepto-Bismol and a lipstick smile the same colour. ‘We’ve picked our flowers!’

Aster nodded, summoned up a smile from years of customer service, and went to work.

  
  


‘Aster,’ Tooth said very seriously, ‘that is  _ not _ what you wear to a nightclub.’

‘What’s wrong with it?’ Aster asked defensively, picking at the edge of his shirt. It was just a pair of dark jeans and a t-shirt, a longsleeved button-up in dark green over it. He’d thought it looked nice. The button-up didn’t even have a ragged hem from constant work in the garden.

‘I just - it’s so  _ plain, _ Bunny!’ she said, looking frustrated and flinging herself dramatically over her loveseat. Her own outfit, some vibrant red short-shorts and a dangerously low cut yellow top, was the opposite of plain. In his head, Aster compared the colours unfavourably with ketchup and mustard, but they looked good and he knew it. She knew it too, the figjam. ‘You’re not going to stand out at all!’ she wailed.

‘I didn’t want to,’ Aster pointed out, stubborn to the end. ‘If ye insist on taking me out on this ridiculous adventure,  _ I  _ insist on dressing meself.’

‘Let me just change the shirt!’

‘Not on yer nelly.’

Tooth looked to Sandy for help; they proceeded to have a conversation entirely in eyebrows and pursed mouths (on Tooth’s part) and beatific smiles (on Sandy’s). Then, Tooth slumped in defeat.

‘Thank ye, Sandy,’ Aster said, and Sandy nodded in acceptance of his permanent place as the most sensible of all of them. His clothing even proved it - a nice, dark goldenrod shirt and black slacks. The fact that the pants were not also yellow was his concession to fashion, and he looked presentable, at least. A bit of a hit or miss, sometimes, but Aster had to admit that even Sandy looked dressier than him.

A booming knock on the front door, and Tooth perked up. ‘I’ll go get it, that’ll be Nick and Natalia,’ she said, leaping to her feet. She looked pointedly at both of them, Sandy in the armchair and Aster on the couch. ‘Sandy, don’t let him do a runner.’

Sandy saluted, the cheeky shit, and Aster scowled while Tooth laughed. Sandy had always played the neutral party in their group; they’d met as international students at the same American uni, years and years ago. Some kind of ‘connect with your peers’ thing Aster had gone to reluctantly.

He’d ended up sitting in the corner, arguing loudly with a massive Russian bloke over the best restaurant in the city, while an Indian girl interjected with the sole intent of egging them on and a Venezuelan boy laughed in a whisper soft voice and kept the argument from coming to blows.

The dynamics hadn’t really changed since, and so when Nicholas St. North bounded into the room, his beautiful and somehow more determinedly Russian girlfriend Natalia shortly behind, Aster got to his feet with a pointing finger that spelled doom.

‘Ye  _ wanker,’  _ he said menacingly. ‘I am going to swap all yer milk for creamer for the next three years, don’t think I won’t.’

‘Bunny, old friend!’ Nick replied, and swept him up into a crushing hug against his red plaid shirt. ‘I am so glad we could convince you to come!’

‘Convince me?!’ Aster sputtered. ‘I was shanghaied into this mess, ye puffed-up mongrel!  _ Convince,’ _ he repeated, rolling his eyes as hard as he could.

‘Da, convince! You would not be here if you did not want to be,’ Nick said with a beaming grin.

Nick’s life was saved by another knock at the door, this one softer than Nick’s house-rattling pounding. ‘Oh! That’s them!’ Tooth said, and ran from the room before Aster could ask. They all traded glances, and Natalia (the most recent addition to their friend group, having been dating Nick for about five months now) adjusted the hem of her silver dress nervously. She’d been a shy thing when she’d first met them all, though that had quickly melted away once they realised she could drink Nick under the table, and was a loud, boisterous drunk besides. This was the first return of that shyness Aster had seen in months, and he gave her an encouraging smile over Nick’s shoulder. Not her fault her boyfriend was a lumberjack-imitating, piss-taking bastard.

She smiled back, and Nick had just put him down when Tooth returned, holding hands with someone Aster had never seen before. ‘Everyone,’ she said, looking completely calm (which meant she was internally panicking), ‘This is Isolde.’

Isolde was lovely, with long, dark brown hair, and pale blue eyes; they managed to balance on the thin line that was true androgyny, slacks and a dressy blue shirt giving away no hints, and Aster supposed that was why Tooth referred to them as - well, them. Wasn’t his business, anyhow, and so he was the first to recover, sticking out his hand and smiling at them. ‘Lo,’ he said pleasantly. ‘I’m Aster, though ye can call me Bunny like the rest of these hoons.’

Isolde’s eyebrows raised straight up, a half smile curving their lips. ‘Wow,’ they said, and their voice was deeper than their appearance would lead one to believe. ‘Tooth wasn’t kidding, you’re about as Australian as they come.’ They shook his hand, and smiled. ‘Pleasure to meet you, Bunny.’

Aster grinned, resolved to get Tooth back somehow for all of this, and stepped back to let Nick descend on Isolde like the Russian hurricane of friendliness and intimidation that he was.

Sandy appeared at Aster’s side, and he looked down at his much shorter friend. ‘Yeah?’

‘They look nice,’ Sandy said in his soft, soft voice. Aster had years of practice at picking it out, even through Nick’s constant almost-shout, and he grinned.

‘Better than the last one, yeah?’

Sandy muttered something in Spanish, which Aster understood precisely none of, and then came forward to introduce himself as well.

Once Isolde had everyone else’s name, Tooth clapped her hands. ‘Alright, we’re off,’ she announced. ‘It’s almost 9:30, that’s not too dreadfully early.’

‘Says ye,’ Aster muttered, thinking longingly of his armchair at home and the new novel he’d hoped to start tonight.

‘Hush, you grump,’ Tooth said, shaking her head. ‘Now, the address is 17 Albright Avenue, Club Antilles.’

‘Got an ‘A’ theme, do they?’ Aster asked, grinning.

‘You’ll fit right in, Aster dear,’ Tooth returned, sugar sweet, and Aster scowled; Isolde at least had the good grace to hide their chuckle behind their hand. ‘We’ll meet up outside and head in, alright? You have to stay at least until midnight, Bunny, or I’ll be very cross,’ she warned. ‘And no leaving without telling us, either! We all leave together, understood?’

‘Yes, mum.’

‘You hush your mouth,’ she said, hands on her hips, but her smile was plain to see. ‘Any other complaints? Yes? Well, I don’t care. Get going.’

They all filed out of Tooth’s house, Aster dragging his heels; this was the last thing he wanted to do, he thought darkly as he waited for Nick and Natalia to shuffle through so he could grab his shoes. He saw himself in the floor-to-ceiling mirror Tooth kept in her foyer, and frowned more. He didn’t look like a man about to go to a club. He looked like a man who was headed to a funeral. Tall, with broad shoulders, though not as tall as Nick, the giant; skin darker than Tooth and Sandy’s combined; thick, wiry, curly grey hair, as always bound back in a ponytail to stay out of his eyes; the pale scar that bisected his upper lip, the token of a childhood surgery to repair a cleft lip. An expression that screamed  _ I do not want to be doing this. _ Not a usual clubgoer, he knew, and certainly not an appealing one.

He grabbed his shoes at last, put them on, and went out to his car. Just until midnight, he told himself, then he was free to go home. A few days of this and he’d be able to tell Tooth to piss off for the rest of his natural life.

With that pleasant thought, he started his car and pulled out of Tooth’s driveway.   
  


 

The club was almost precisely as annoying as he’d predicted it would be, and Aster took a petty comfort in that. The lights, the people (some of them looked fresh out of secondary,  _ honestly), _ the entire scene was exactly how Aster had envisioned it. The only thing the club had going for it was the bar, as far as Aster was concerned, even if it was pricey. Though, he had to admit, the music wasn’t  _ awful. _ Mostly remixes and samples of songs he did actually know, having heard them on the radio or such, and he kept finding himself tapping his foot to the beat. He’d not expected Nina Simone’s voice, that was for sure.

He looked out on the crowded dance floor his friends had disappeared into, and couldn't see any of them. Isolde and Tooth had made for the dance floor as soon as they’d walked through the door, and he’d seen neither of them since. Sandy had trundled off, bobbing his head to the not-terrible music, and Nicholas had let Natalia drag him into the fray with the kind of lovesick expression that Aster only saw on bad romance novel covers.    


Not that he owned those.   


He sighed and finished off the overpriced beer in his hand and turned to order another.   


As the barkeep handed him one and he dropped a tip into the jar, he heard beside him, 'You should be dancing, looking like that.'   


He turned his head to see that a bloke had hopped up onto the stool beside him, and was smiling in a way that was both friendly and predatory.   


'Looking like what?' Aster replied, thrown off-guard by the abrupt address.   


The bloke's smile grew; it was a nice smile, if youthful and toothy, and sat pleasantly beneath a cute nose and a pair of blue eyes that were bright as electricity. 'Like that,' he replied, and pushed his untamed sprawl of white hair behind his ear (must be dye, Aster thought, without good reason.) 'You know -' he made a lazy up and down sweeping gesture with his free hand as the barkeep passed him and nodded without saying a word. 'Gorgeous.'   


Aster looked down at himself self-consciously, fingers touching the edge of his shirt, before he told himself he was being ridiculous and looked back up.   


The bloke was watching him, the smile still that strange mixture of amiable and hungry, and Aster flushed. Bless his dark complexion.   


'Er,' he said, then cursed himself internally. 'Thank ye.'   


'The accent doesn't hurt, either,' the bloke added, and now he looked mischievous, as if he knew that Aster was floundering. 'So why aren't you dancing, looking and sounding like that?' he asked, and accepted a drink from the barkeep with a familiar nod - a regular, then.   


'I - don't dance,' Aster admitted, watching the bloke and hoping he'd leave him alone - and in a small but growing way, hoping that he wouldn't. Which was ridiculous, and he firmly ignored it.   


'At all?' the bloke asked, and took a drink. It looked like a rum and coke, but Aster didn't drink often enough that he could tell on sight alone. 'Man, you're in the wrong nightclub, then.'   


'Ye're telling me,' Aster sighed.   


'Why are you here, then?' he asked, leaning on the bar and watching Aster with curious eyes that glinted in the changing lights that were currently strobing on the dance floor.   


'Friends,' Aster shrugged. 'Club crawl - nostalgia's sake.'   


'You don't look old enough to have  _ anything _ for nostalgia's sake.'   


'I'm thirty-one,' Aster answered, and expected a lot of different responses to that. A polite but hurried excuse to leave. Exaggerated, flirtatious surprise. Even, maybe, a bit of mean humour, how old men like him shouldn't risk their hips on the club scene.   


What he got instead was a boyish grin and a laugh that was bizarrely - kind. 'You're only five years older than me, you're definitely not old enough,' the bloke chuckled. The laughter shook free his hair from its precarious perch behind his ear, and he pushed it back again carelessly, gracefully.   


'Ye're not twenty six,' Aster objected, startled into it. 'Ye look like ye had to buy the ID with the cover charge.'   


'Who said I had to pay the cover charge?' the bloke challenged, all cheek, and Aster laughed, surprising himself. The bloke looked absolutely rapt about it, his expression almost innocent in the kaleidoscope lights. 'So you never dance?'   


'With people I know,' Aster allowed. 'But all me mates have run off. Bit of a ratbag move, that.'   


The bloke laughed again, looking delighted. 'You're hysterical,' he said, and looked so genuine that Aster let himself believe he meant it. 'So dance with me.'   


Aster froze. 'What?' he asked after a long, awkward moment (though he thought all the awkwardness might be his own. The bloke looked perfectly at ease.)   


'Dance with me,' the bloke repeated. His smile hadn't shifted an inch. 'We're talking, we're getting along. You could even say you know me.'   


'We've been talking five minutes,' Aster said weakly.   


The bloke's smile changed, turned a little stranger, if still at ease. Aster didn't know what to call it. 'Have we?' the bloke asked. 'Feels like it's been longer. Besides, other than your friends, don't you think we know each other better than we know anyone else on the floor?'   


The logic was strange, ridiculous, but also charming; the way the bloke grinned, his hair flopping out from his ear once more and forcing him to tuck it back yet again, was endearing. Aster felt - off, somehow. Not in a bad way, he thought as he sipped his beer and the bloke waited patiently for his answer. Just off-balance. Like he didn't know what would happen next, for the first time in a long time.   


His life was predictable, he knew. He woke early in the morning, opened his shop; worked until four, closed the shop; went home and tended his garden, did the shopping if necessary. Sat down, read a book or watched the telly, went to bed. Repeat. He always knew precisely what his schedule was, when his appointments and meetings were, the florists convention he attended secretly each year (though, of course, Sandy knew. Sandy knew everything.) He knew exactly what would happen, from any given moment. He'd thought he'd known precisely what would happen tonight, and the next two.   


With the strange, white haired, blue eyed bloke still smiling, still waiting, Aster realised he'd had no idea at all.   


'Ye know what,' Aster said, and drained the last of his beer. 'I reckon ye're right.'   


The bloke laughed again, and sounded so pleased that the faint warmth already at work in Aster's body after the two beers grew a little stronger. 'Awesome,' he said, and hopped down from the stool. He wasn't terribly short by the average standard, but Aster knew he was a tall man; the crown of the bloke's head barely reached his chin. Beside Nick, he’d look tiny as a tyke. He tilted his head up, looking utterly unintimidated by the height difference, and held out his hand.   


'What's yer name?' Aster asked. 'I'm Aster, but me friends call me Bunny.'   


'Friends, huh?' the bloke returned, and winked. 'Moving so quickly, Bunny - why, we've barely met!’ He fluttered his eyelashes ridiculously. ‘Or so you say.'   


'And ye still think ye know me better than most on the dance floor,' Aster replied, and the bloke snorted.   


'I'm Jack,' he said, and wiggled his fingers. 'Come on, show me what you're made of.'   


'Don't say I didn't warn ye,' Aster said, and finally set his broad hand in Jack's pale fingers.   


'Oh, I'm very good,' Jack replied. 'I'll make up for it if you suck, don't worry.'   


An irrelevant, entirely inappropriate thought popped into Aster's head, and he shook it away as Jack turned to lead him onto the floor. It was a dance, was all. Aster would be terrible and Jack would run off. This would go nowhere like  _ that,  _ and he was frankly embarrassed for himself that the thought had even occurred to him.   


They entered the mass of bodies, and though Aster peered around, he couldn't make out the shape of a single friend. They might as well have been in another club entirely, he thought grumpily, then was startled when a hand brushed over his mouth to poke at one of the corners, catching just a bit on the raised scar of Aster’s upper lip.   


He looked down, and Jack smiled up at him. 'Come on, it won't be that bad,' he coaxed, fingers unmoving where they rested on Aster's cheek. It was a startlingly intimate gesture, kind and out of place with the gyrating, tense and hungry atmosphere of the dancers around them. Aster could only stare. 'One dance, then I'll let you go back to being a wallflower, promise.'   


'I'm no such thing,' Aster huffed; he was hardly delicate. He was just reluctant.   


Jack's smile took on that secretive edge again. 'Are you sure?' he teased, and then spun in place, the beat precisely timed with the steps of his feet. Aster had always thought dancing was the other way around - timed to the music - but Jack made it look as if the music had been waiting for him to start moving. 'You're holding pretty still for a dancer.'   


'This isn't me kind of dancing,' Aster admitted, beginning to sway from side to side awkwardly. He jerked his head towards a nearby pair, who were about three articles of clothing away from an public indecency charge. It had been years since he’d been at any club at all, and even then he’d never been any good at it.   


Jack shrugged, the movement becoming a shoulder roll that coincided with a long descending run of notes. 'Not really mine, either,' he said. 'I'd rather actually dance than  _ that. _ Here, you're doing it wrong -'   


His hands landed on Aster's hips, and Aster went still.   


'You've got to move with these, first,' Jack said, and wasn't it strange, how well Aster could hear him, despite the thumping music? 'It's the first rule of dancing, Bunny, jeez. If you've got hips,  _ move _ them.'   


'Haven't got hips,' Aster protested, but when Jack tugged to his left, Aster's right, he let his hip lead the way. Surprisingly, the movement was more graceful than he'd thought it would be, and when he swayed back to his left, hip-first once more, it actually might have looked like real dancing.   


'Better,' Jack grinned, looking satisfied, hands still light where they rested on the waistband of Aster's jeans. 'Look at you, Cottontail, you're a natural.'   


'Excuse me?' Aster said, blinking.   


'Bunny? Cottontail, Bun-bun...' Jack's smile was twitching, like he wanted to laugh but was saving it for a better joke. 'With the accent? Kangaroo, at least.'   


Aster laughed again, the feeling somewhere between mirth and an almost fond annoyance, and Jack laughed with him.   


'Here,' Jack said, and let go of Aster's hips, one hand snapping out to the side and fingers trailing through the air as the song changed. 'Let's try something a little harder.'   


He snagged Aster's hand and tugged, and Aster followed, thrown off by the sudden movement; then, he swore a little as somehow Jack spun him, despite being almost a foot shorter.   


'Are ye mad?' Aster demanded, almost tripping over himself, but Jack's hands fell to his hips once more and steadied him.   


'A little, probably,' Jack replied, and laughed at the look on Aster's face. 'What, you think anyone who comes to these things willingly isn't a little crazy?'   


Aster acknowledged the excellent point by firmly ignoring it. 'Ye could warn a bloke before ye bail him up.'   


'I have no idea what you just said,' Jack replied immediately, 'but wow, do I like the way you said it.'   


Aster ducked his head, overwarm; it was the heat of the dance floor around them, he told himself. The bodies moving. The beers beforehand.   


'God, you're cute,' Jack added, which did nothing to help. 'Come on - dance with me.'   


Aster lifted his eyes, and Jack was waiting, patient.   


He was strange, unexpected; he did bizarre things, said even stranger ones. And god help him, but Aster liked it.   


'Don't spin me again,' Aster warned instead, because he was himself and he had his pride.   


'No promises,' Jack replied, and Aster thought that maybe Jack was the kind of unpredictable you came to anticipate. Maybe you were never quite prepared, but when you never knew what was coming, maybe you could come to find a balance amidst the whirlwind.   


The song changed again, then again - Aster lost count. It was hard to measure time except by way of the beat, and that changed, too - sometimes so rapid that it was hard to keep up with Jack, and at other times slow enough that Aster wondered how they managed to dance to it at all. How he managed to dance in the first place.   


It wasn't quite mimicry, because he knew well he could never imitate the otherworldly grace Jack had. He moved like he'd never heard the word gravity - little leaps and spins, precisely timed hip movements, bobs of the head that led into turns of the body. He hadn't been kidding. He was  _ very _ good.   


Aster, instead, found ways to move around him, to move with him; Jack quickly realised that not only was Aster tall, but he was strong, and Aster spinning Jack had much better results than the other way around. Jack could move easily within the confines of Aster’s arms, and seemed to enjoy the challenge of the close quarters, hands skimming up Aster’s bare forearms at unpredictable intervals. He was pale in the precise way Aster was dark, and the rainbow lights above them coloured him red blue yellow green. He was colourful and beautiful and Aster hadn’t thought that about anyone since college, since the last time he’d done something like this.

Tooth would never let him live it down, so he resolved never to tell her.

The crowd was just beginning to thin when Jack caught Aster’s hand in a casual, familiar grip. Aster tried to find it strange, but couldn’t bring himself to.

‘Come on, I’m thirsty,’ Jack said, and flashed the charming smile from before, when he’d called Aster gorgeous. ‘Buy me a drink?’

Aster, made brave by something he didn’t understand - the beer, maybe, or the dance - smiled back, and held his hand out. ‘I’d love to, Jack.’

They left the floor behind, the dancers who never seemed to tire, and for the first time, Aster felt like them, akin to them. He had no idea how long he had danced, had no idea what time it was, and had never felt so energised in his life.

Aster watched as Jack signalled the barkeep, who began to pour his drink; a rum and coke, like Aster had thought.

‘This is the last one of the night,’ the barkeep said, sounding bored. ‘Last call’s in three.’

Aster startled, and traded a glance with Jack; it was almost two.

Then, to Aster’s surprise, Jack swore.

‘Fuck, I’ve gotta go,’ he said, and threw back the rum and coke in a handful of seconds. Aster watched the line of his throat a little helplessly, the attraction no longer able to be foisted off on alcohol or temperature. It had been, apparently,  _ hours _ since his last drink, and they were no longer surrounded by the body heat of who knew how many other dancers. There was nothing now but Jack, apparently about to disappear, and something in Aster gave a pang.

Jack dropped the drink, then snagged Aster’s wrist. ‘Put this guy’s drinks on my tab,’ he said to the barkeep with a roguish smile.

‘You don’t have a tab,’ the barkeep replied, sounding like he’d had this conversation at least four times beforehand.

‘Says you,’ Jack returned, and began to tug on Aster again, towing him away from the bar.

Aster, more than a little lost, could only find it in him to say, ‘I thought  _ I _ was buying ye a drink, not the other way ‘round.’

‘Sorry, Bun-bun, another time,’ Jack said carelessly, and the same thing in Aster panged again. He knew there wouldn’t be. ‘I don’t have a lot of it, you see.’ Jack continued, snapping Aster out of his thoughts.

‘A lot of what?’

‘A lot of time, Roo, keep up,’ Jack said, and spun, and Aster almost walked into him. They were near the back of the club now, not so far that they were straying into employee’s only territory, but far enough that they stood alone for a span of three or so meters in either direction. A small pocket of privacy in the crowd of dancers and partiers. ‘I’ve gotta run.’

‘I see,’ Aster said, and was proud of how even it came out.

‘Don’t look so grumpy,’ Jack said, and his hands came up, framed Aster’s face. It wasn’t quite a  _ friendly _ touch, too soft and intimate, but it didn’t have any of the hunger from earlier, the predatory sensation Jack had held in his smile and his eyes. Aster didn’t know what to make of the hold, but was incapable of not leaning into it a little. Jack’s eyes flashed, twinkling in the still-strong club lights. ‘We’ll run into each other again.’

‘Probably won’t,’ Aster said, and the regret was so strong in his voice that there was no way Jack missed it.

Jack’s smile went secretive, mysterious, like he knew everything and Aster was floundering after the answers. ‘I’ve got a good feeling about it,’ he murmured, then went up on his tiptoes, the palms cupping Aster’s face becoming a grip.

The kiss was stunningly gentle, and Aster returned it as such, nudging Jack’s round nose with his own flat one, sliding his arms around Jack’s waist and pulling him near, making the height difference less of an issue. Jack sighed softly, and the new thing inside Aster pulsed in response, heat and warmth different things in his chest but born from the same flame.

‘Trust me,’ Jack said, pulling away, and Aster let him go. ‘I’ll see you around, Mr. Bunnymund.’

Then he turned and disappeared into the still-thick throngs on the dance floor, leaving Aster frozen behind him.

‘Bunny, dear! Bunny, there you are!’

A tiny hand landed on Aster’s arm, and he turned, surprised, to see Tooth. ‘We’ve been looking for you,’ she twittered, already pulling him towards the exit. ‘Honestly, disappearing like that just to hide - that wasn’t the  _ point  _ of all this, Bunny!’

‘I didn’t disappear,’ Aster protested, still too shocked to resist her ushering. ‘If anything, it was  _ ye _ lot who went walkabout, I was perfectly fine at the bar.’

‘You haven’t been at the bar for  _ hours,  _ Bunny,’ Tooth replied, sounding very exasperated. ‘I owe Sandy twenty dollars now!’

‘Ye bet him I scarpered, didn’t ye.’

‘If I don’t admit it then I’m still your best friend,’ she sniffed, and he snorted.

‘That’d be North, and ye know it.’

‘That hurts, Bunny, dear.’

‘So does getting dragged round to the clubs against me will.’

‘I’m glad you agree to do this again tomorrow!’ Tooth exclaimed as they neared the others, and Aster groaned as Nick perked up at the announcement; there would be no getting out of it now.

‘We’re going somewhere different tomorrow,’ Tooth continued to chirp at him, settling in at the side of Isolde, who looked down at her with their perpetual half-smile. ‘So you’ll have to devise new escape strategies.’

‘Ah, you did try to escape,’ Nick said, looking sad, and began to rummage in his pockets for change.

‘I did  _ not,’ _ Aster argued, irritated, and everyone paused to stare at him, even the laid-back Sandy.

‘Well, then,’ Natalia said, her soft voice hesitant, ‘where did you go?’

_ Fuck, _ Aster thought, well aware that no matter what he said, he was in for a ribbing. ‘I was -’ he took a deep breath. ‘I was dancing.’

Silence.

‘You are of course pulling leg,’ Nick said after a long moment, and Aster scowled.

‘I’m not, ye bloody whacker,’ he snapped. ‘I was dancing, I did not leave the bloody rager, are ye lot done or will I have to give ye a blow-by-blow?’

Sandy gave him a look that was somewhere between scolding and ravenously curious (no one’s face spoke so eloquently as Sandy’s), and Aster sighed.

‘Later, when I’ve - I’m not sure what happened, to give ye the drum,’ he admitted into the expectant silence. ‘It was strange, and that’s all I can tell ye. It’s going to take some thinking.’

‘We’ll never get the answer, then,’ Tooth teased, and like that, the tension was broken.

They laughed and split up to their different cars or called their taxis, agreeing to meet at Tooth’s again at nine the following night, and Tooth kissed Isolde goodbye before they got into their taxi. Then, it was just Tooth and Aster, having parked farther down the street.

‘Penny for your thoughts, dear,’ she said, and Aster sighed.

‘I really don’t understand it, Tooth, it’s not going to make sense.’

‘Maybe if you talk it through with me, it’ll help,’ she coaxed. She hopped up onto the trunk of her car as they reached it, long braid swung over her shoulder, and smiled at him. ‘Come on, spill.’

Aster sighed, rubbed his face with his hand. ‘I was at the bar.’

‘No surprise there.’

‘Hush, ye. I was at the bar, and a bloke came up to me.’

‘Well, that’s normal at these kind of clubs, dear,’ Tooth replied with a bit of a smirk. ‘You didn’t think I’d take all of us to clubs we weren’t welcome at, do you?’

‘Do ye want to hear what happened or not?’ Aster said, a little snappish. Tooth pursed her lips, hurt, and he sighed. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean - I’m sorry.’

‘Accepted,’ she said. Then she mimed zipping her lips closed.

‘So a bloke came up to me, and started chatting me up - cracking on to me. I wasn’t expecting it, to be honest.’

Tooth began to say something, then stopped, and Aster rolled his eyes. ‘Alright, what?’

‘Bunny, sweetheart,’ she said, reaching out and patting his shoulder, ‘You’re an idiot.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You’re disgustingly good looking, even when you’re dressed in a plain t-shirt and jeans,’ she explained, rolling her eyes. ‘I’m surprised you weren’t  _ swarmed, _ this man must have been intimidating or something to keep the others off you.’

Aster snorted. ‘He was barely a hundred seventy five, Tooth, he wasn’t intimidating anyone.’

Tooth’s eyebrows rose. ‘He wasn’t even five nine and he approached  _ you?’ _

Aster reached over and poked her. ‘Tooth, ye and Sandy are the size of a tot, ye don’t get to judge anyone.’

‘I’m a perfectly respectable five foot three!’

‘Ye’re five two and a half.’

‘You promised never to mention that!’

Aster shrugged.

‘You’re a pain,’ she muttered. ‘Anywho, so a guy approached you. What’s so strange about that? It was sort of the point of coming along.’

Aster sighed. ‘It just  _ was, _ Tooth. He was - crikey, I dunno. He was funny and clever, and asked me to dance, so I did.’

‘Okay, that is strange,’ Tooth mused, and Aster scowled.

_ ‘Anyway, _ we danced. That was fine. It was -’ Aster’s brain tried to come up with a word, but all of them sounded ridiculously starstruck, so he ended with a lame, ‘...fine. Then we went to get a drink and it was last call.’

Tooth stared at him. ‘You danced for  _ hours _ and you didn’t even notice?’ she said slowly.

Aster’s scowl returned. ‘Don’t sound so bloody rapt about it, I’m not finished yet. So it’s last call, and Jack -’

‘His name’s Jack, ooh.’

‘-  _ hush,  _ ye stickybeak sheila - panics, says he has to go. Drags me off after him, tells me we’ll probably see each other again, I tell him not likely - especially since we’re not coming back here tomorrow - and he just…’

Aster sighed. ‘He had this look, sometimes, like he - I dunno, knew more than I did. He tells me he has a good feeling about it, kisses me -’

‘Oh my god,’ Tooth said, and almost fell off her car’s trunk. ‘You  _ kissed  _ him?’

‘He kissed me!’ Aster defended.

‘You’re going to tell me you danced with this guy for hours, and you didn’t kiss him back?’

‘I didn’t - I never said I -’ Aster floundered, then rallied. ‘Damn it, Tooth, let me finish! So he kisses me, and then says,  _ I’ll see you around, Mr. Bunnymund. _ Then he ran off and ye found me.’

‘Wow, mysterious,’ Tooth cooed, but paused; Aster imagined that whatever expression he wore, it must have communicated that something was wrong, because she took his hand and said, ‘Bunny, dear, what is it?’

‘Tooth,’ Aster said, swallowing hard, ‘I never told him me last name.’

The street was strangely silent, the ambient noise of cars and talking and laughter distant as she stared at him.

‘Maybe - maybe he knew you from somewhere?’ she tried, but Aster shook his head.

‘Tooth, I’ve never seen him before in me life,’ he explained firmly. ‘I can’t imagine I’d have missed him - white hair, blue eyes? Tooth, who  _ looks _ like that?’

‘Jack, apparently,’ Tooth replied, but she looked disturbed. ‘Aster, I don’t like this,’ she said at last, and squeezed his hand. ‘Maybe he’s harmless, maybe he’s not. Goodness, I’m glad we’re going elsewhere tomorrow,’ she added, and her shiver was nowhere near theatrical.

Aster wasn’t sure how he felt. On the one hand, Jack had… he’d been so charming, so friendly. Kind, in a strange way, and gentle, and the kiss had been more satisfying than most anything Aster had experienced in a long time.

But how had he known Aster’s name? He wasn’t a customer, couldn’t be, Aster would have recognised him.

Wouldn’t he?

‘Bunny, dear?’

‘M’fine,’ Aster said, and even managed to sound so. ‘I’ll see ye tomorrow, Tooth, no dramas. Honestly, what’s the chances of me running into him at another club in the city? He acted like a regular, likely won’t see him again if I don’t come back here.’

‘What if he’s - I don’t know, a crazy stalker?’ Tooth demanded.

‘He wasn’t crazy,’ Aster asserted, certain of that, at least. ‘Tooth, he didn’t - he wasn’t  _ dangerous,  _ I promise. It didn’t feel like -’ he paused, and then muttered a curse under his breath. ‘It was like - a game. A chase. If he hadn’t wanted me to know he knew who I was, he wouldn’t have let me know at all.’

Tooth looked sceptical. ‘How can you be sure? You don’t really know him, Bunny.’

Aster smiled, a little helplessly. ‘I have a good feeling about it,’ he said, and she sighed.

‘It’s no use telling you to be careful, is it?’ she asked, and Aster felt a little guilty, at the resigned look she gave him. ‘I know you. He knows you, too, apparently. You’re not going to give up until you know why he did this.’

Aster’s grin turned sheepish on his face, and she sighed again. ‘Just - oh, Bunny, don’t do anything too stupid, alright?’ She hopped off her car as he huffed, affronted. ‘Please, for my sanity.’

Aster rolled his eyes. ‘Promise,’ he said grudgingly, and she nodded, satisfied. ‘Good night, Tooth. See ye tomorrow.’

‘Get some sleep, and close the damn shop!’ she said, pointing her finger at him. ‘Or at least open late, you’re going to need the sleep for where we’re going!’

Aster groaned, resolved to ignore that piece of advice (this is why he was the business owner and she worked in a high end fashion boutique), and waved goodbye before heading home.

If he still felt the phantom press of Jack’s lips, when he touched his mouth, then that was just his overtired mind, was all.


	2. Friday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://8tracks.com/proser132/friday-slip-side

****‘I’m terribly sorry,’ Aster said to the gaggle of teenagers - the same from yesterday, he supposed the orange lilies they’d picked hadn’t gone over as well as they’d liked. ‘We’re closing in a mo’, just so ye lot know.’

A number of them traded distressed looks, and Aster had to work to keep from raising his eyebrow. He was sort of surprised they’d come in at all today; it was a right beaut of a storm outside, though the forecast had said it’d be gone come six or so. That was a good five hours from now though, and still they had trooped in, chattering amongst themselves in their dripping raincoats and their kaleidoscope hair colours. If they hadn’t actually spent time examining some of the flowers on display, Aster would have assumed they ducked in to take advantage of the roof and the heating.

The boy with pastel blue locks spilling out of his hood elbowed the kid to his left, wrapped so tight against the rain that Aster couldn’t tell which of the peacocks he was; in turn, he flapped a hand at the one with the tall too-bright green mohawk.

‘It’s okay,’ the green-haired one sighed. He shrugged across the group to the pink-haired girl from the day before, who stood arm in arm with the reedy kid with the fake-looking black hair. Aster thought that the kid would have done better with a dark purple, then shook the thought away with some horror; crikey, next he was going to be giving fashion tips alongside Tooth.

He’d always had an eye for colour, though. He’d just chosen to put that to use in flower arrangements, and the occasional little watercolour, rather than become the figjam clotheshorse Tooth prided herself on being.

‘We’ll get going,’ the green-haired boy continued, sounding disappointed.

‘I thought you closed at four,’ one of the girls said, her sunburst gradient dye job a little less impressive when soaked and plastered to her skull. Honestly, he was going to learn to tell them apart by their hair colours, if they didn’t start changing them soon.

‘Closing early today,’ Aster replied apologetically, only just managing to not roll his eyes. His damn business, he’d close when he wanted to. ‘I’ve got other bizzo to attend to this afternoon, sorry about that.’

The sunhaired girl huffed; he reckoned there had to be six or seven of them today, all clumped together as if frightened they’d lose one of them in his tiny bloody shop. ‘Alright,’ she muttered, as if she was doing him a grand favour.

 _‘Pippa,’_ a boy with gold and red wrapped braids said, and elbowed her, hard. ‘We’ll get going sir, we’ll just have to come back another day.’

‘No dramas, we’ll be open again on Monday,’ Aster said, smiling, and the whole lot trooped back out, talking amongst themselves.

Today had been a strange day; he was unsure whether it was the tiredness from having opened at his usual time, after a scant three hours of sleep, or it was a remnant of the haze that had fallen over him the night before.

He felt off-balance, and not in the good way he’d been in the club; there, Jack had been solid, laughing and smiling and spinning under Aster’s hands. In the light of day, the memories had gone ephemeral, like a fantastic dream - improbable and out of sorts. He still felt Jack’s mouth against his at strange moments. He’d even thought he’d heard Jack’s voice among the teenagers, but he’d not seen a single strand of white hair.

He was obsessing, he knew it. Tooth had been right.

He locked up after the gaggle had left, and spent an increasingly irritable half hour mopping up the water they’d left behind before he could get to the actual work of tidying his shop. He knew he ought to get around to hiring help at some point; he could certainly afford it, with business as it was, and he could use the help. He just wasn’t sure he wanted to trust someone else with his flowers just yet.

By the time he finished, it had gone two thirty, and he cursed a bit under his breath as he pulled on his jacket and pulled his green umbrella from the peg on the wall. It wasn’t too much later than he’d wanted to leave, but any delay grated on his nerves, and he near stomped out to his car, parked precariously as ever in the tiny alley behind his shop; he waved to the Cantonese woman who owned the restaurant that was his neighbour as she hauled out a bag of trash to the dumpster.

‘Rabbit!’ she called (he’d told her to call him Bunny a million times, but each time she had replied ‘You are much too tall to be _bunny._ You are Rabbit. Maybe Hare.’ He’d long given up). ‘Has been long time since you had lunch here! I am thinking you found a new favourite restaurant!’

Aster took a deep breath and gathered himself. Wasn’t her fault; he oughtn’t be stroppy just because he was an impatient bastard. ‘Never, Mrs. Cheung,’ he called back. ‘There’s not a better youtiao in the city.’

‘And you shouldn’t forget it!’ she returned. ‘Now, I expect to hear from you soon! You will waste away, the way you eat!’

Aster somehow doubted that, but nodded and waved to her before she ducked back in through the kitchen door, the scent of frying rice and vegetables wafting out into the thick rain before it clicked closed.

He opened his car door and through a tricky manoeuvre it had taken him six years to master, managed to sit, close his umbrella, and shut the door behind him in under ten seconds. It had been a necessary skill to learn; but he was from Australia, Woop Woop in the middle of the GAFA. He’d not had much chance to practise _evading_ rain before he’d come to the States. No wonder it had taken him long as it did.

He stared at the wheel of his car for a long moment, dark brown hands on dark grey plastic. What was he doing? It was mad, he knew it was mad; he should listen to Tooth, let it go.

He couldn’t.

He started the engine before he could talk himself out of it (or into it; he wasn’t sure, anymore) and drove out of the alley.

Albright Avenue was a different scene in the grey light of day, less busy by a far mile; he counted eight cars in total on the entire street, and parking was easy to find. Even the bar down the road looked mostly empty, the small businesses in between quiet; he killed the engine and got out of the car, unnerved as he opened his umbrella. It might well have been another street entirely.

He went up to the door of Club Antilles, not particularly hopeful that it would be open. It was a nightclub, after all. But perhaps, if he knocked, there would be an employee inside, and if so, he might be able to find the bartender who had worked the night before.

If, if, if. If he found the bloke, if he was willing to tell him anything, if there was anything to tell at all.

Anticipation and anxiety sat on his tongue like a lemon drop, too sweet and too sour to tell apart. Hope was a painful thing, at times, and he lifted his hand to try the knob.

To his surprise, it turned and the door opened.

He took a deep breath, blessed his luck, and headed inside, teeth worrying at the scar of his upper lip - a tic he’d had since it had finished healing after the surgery. He found the club almost completely empty.

‘It’s a bit early to start, doncha think,’ a voice called over to him, and he turned to see a woman wiping down the bar, dressed in the same uniform as the bartender from the night before. ‘Coulda sworn I locked that after me.’

‘I’m here looking for someone,’ Aster tried to explain, walking over.

‘Isn’t everyone?’ she quipped, and laughed at the face he pulled. She swapped the hand she was wiping the bar down with and smiled. ‘Give me a name, and I’ll see what I can do - fair warning, though, I’m new, so I don’t know everyone yet.’

‘I’m not looking for a customer - I mean, I am, but not first,’ Aster explained, fumbling a bit. ‘I’m looking for the bloke who tended the bar last night?’

‘Oh, Marcus?’ she said, and stood up straight, grinning. ‘Wow, you’re lucky, normally he wouldn’t be in until eight or so, but he came in to help me out with setup. Hold on - MARCUS!’ she hollered towards the back, where Jack had pulled him, where Jack had kissed him.

Empty, the club looked much bigger than he’d remembered it.

‘WHAT?’ came the answering shout. ‘LUCY, I ALREADY TOLD YOU WHERE WE STORE THE FUCKING GARNISHES -’

‘IT’S NOT ABOUT THE GODDAMN GARNISHES,’ she shouted back, looking like she was having the time of her life. Aster, for his part, had never thought he’d meet someone who could outshout Nick, and so was a little stunned with the revelation that such a person existed. ‘SOMEONE’S LOOKING FOR YOU!’

‘IF IT’S BILLY, YOU CAN TELL HIM TO FUCK OFF -’

‘IT’S NOT BILLY, HE’S WAY CUTER!’

‘Er,’ Aster said, mortified, and she winked at him.

‘I mean, you are,’ she said. ‘It’ll get him out here way faster, promise.’

‘Who the -’ the voice said, getting closer, then out came the bloke who’d tended bar the night before, looking like he was about to murder someone. He drew up short at the sight of Aster, though. ‘Do I know you?’ he asked, squinting, and Aster chuckled awkwardly.

‘No, ye don’t,’ he said. ‘I came to ask ye about a regular?’

Marcus wasn’t rude, precisely, but he looked more than a touch annoyed. ‘Got a lot of those, my man.’

‘Right,’ Aster said. ‘I’m looking for a Jack?’

Marcus frowned. ‘I don’t know a Jack.’

Aster’s heart stopped, then promptly began to sink.

‘About yea high,’ he said, holding his hand just under his chin. ‘White hair?’

There was a brief look that crossed Marcus’ face, but it transformed back into the irritation too quickly for Aster to interpret it. It hadn’t looked promising, though; maybe confusion. ‘Lots of people with white hair, nowadays,’ he said dismissively. ‘Sorry, but I’ve got no clue. Can’t help you.’

Aster swallowed, trying hard not to let the sick feeling show on his face, and nodded. ‘Alright. Thank ye. I’m sorry for interrupting yer work.’

Marcus’ face lost a good deal of the irritation at that, and he shrugged. ‘It’s cool, I’m just helping Newbie Lucy here anyway. Sorry I couldn’t help you more.’

‘He sounds cute,’ Lucy said, having thrown Marcus a dirty look before looking back to Aster. ‘I hope you find him. It’s kind of romantic, isn’t it?’ she sighed. ‘Meeting someone at a club, not knowing who they are, having to look for them…’

Aster, despite himself, snorted. ‘Maybe in romance novels,’ he said, and ignored the little tinge of wistfulness that crept into his voice. ‘It’s a lot more annoying than it sounds.’

Lucy laughed at that, Marcus managing a smile, and Aster thanked them both before heading out of the club. Once he closed his car door behind him, he took a second to just stare at his hands.

Jack had seemed like a regular the night before - Marcus had to have known him to make him a usual drink without even speaking - but now, today, Marcus didn’t know him? Couldn’t recognise his name?

‘What the hell,’ Aster whispered to himself. ‘What in the bloody buggering fuck.’

How was this possible? It was as if Jack had bloomed into being on the stool beside him, and dissipated like smoke once he’d left Aster and returned to the dance floor. As if he’d never been there at all.

Aster felt crazy for even thinking it, but so much had been bizarre that he had to wonder if, well… if he had made it up.

There was such a surreal quality to his memories of the night - the club hadn’t been that large, there was no way he could have misplaced all of his friends for so long, was there? Or that they hadn’t seen him on the dance floor. He and Nick had to have been the tallest people there, they shouldn’t have missed each other.

Unless he’d been so focussed on Jack that he’d not even thought to look. Unless they hadn’t even thought to look for him with the other dancers, because they all knew Aster didn’t dance, hadn’t danced since college, hadn’t even wanted to be there.

He’d even thought, stepping into the space, that it was larger than he’d remembered, hadn’t he? Then maybe...

But then how did he explain Marcus?

Aster dropped his head to the steering wheel. ‘I’m going mad,’ he murmured into the plastic. ‘I’m going stark raving mad, I’m going to start talking to meself next.’

He paused. Rewound the past few seconds of his life. Then cursed loudly and started the damn car.

  


‘Oh, Aster,’ Tooth said as he walked into her living room, ‘what did you _do?’_

Aster paused, looked down at himself. Darker jeans tonight, a little tighter than the last pair (they ought to be, they were almost eight years old). A white t-shirt, a different button up in a soft blue-green plaid pattern. ‘Tooth, I look fine,’ he protested.

‘Not that, you idiot,’ she said, sitting up; she’d been lying on her couch while Isolde braided what looked like some kind of tinsel into her hair, their fingers moving quickly and expertly through Tooth’s long, thick strands. Isolde made a protesting noise, and Tooth turned around so they could continue, pressing a kiss to their cheek as she did. ‘You did something today. You look like you haven’t slept at all, Bunny, dear. You look _dreadful.’_

Aster flinched; crikey, it must be bad if it was showing on his face. He’d gone home after the Club Antilles debacle, trying to get some sleep before tonight, but he’d tossed and turned and ultimately had to give up.

‘I’m fine, Tooth,’ he said at last, and her face ticked down into a frown. ‘I promise, I’m just a bit rattled. I went back, and -’

‘Wait,’ she said, and Isolde finished braiding her hair before beginning to wrap it in a tight bun, the tinsel making a spiral pattern that shimmered in the light. ‘Are you sure you want to talk about it now?’

Aster gave her a look. ‘Beg pardon?’

‘I mean, you’ll just have to explain it to everyone all over again,’ she pointed out. ‘Just wait until Sandy, Nick, and Natalia get here, alright?’

He pulled a face, and Tooth smiled, even if it was a bit strained.

‘Tooth, I barely wanted to tell _ye,_ much less the whole bag of weasels,’ he said. ‘Ye lot will think I’ve gone troppo and stick me in the loony bin, see if ye won’t.’

‘I’m sure it’s not that bad, Bunny,’ Isolde said, smiling their half smile at him.

He chuckled in response, but it wasn’t a happy sound, and both of them stared at him. ‘Believe ye me, it really is,’ he replied darkly, and sat down on the armchair to wait.

Nick and Natalia came in next, laughing together, but the sound died as soon as they entered the living room; Sandy was a few minutes later, and he’d not been in the room ten seconds before he bustled over to Aster and started fussing with his shirt, his hair, whatever Sandy could reach (which was more than normal, given that Aster was sitting). ‘Are you sick, Aster?’ he asked, voice unusually loud in the silent room.

 _Sick in the head, maybe._ ‘No, not sick,’ he said instead. ‘I’m fine, just -’

‘Is about last night, da?’ Nick asked, face pulled tight in concern.

‘Yeah,’ Aster admitted. Sandy went to sit beside Isolde and Tooth, Nick and Natalia having taken the loveseat, and Aster sighed. ‘Alright, some of this I’ve told Tooth, and I don’t want to go too deep into it again.’

‘We understand,’ Natalia murmured, and smiled at him much the same way he had smiled at her twenty-four hours past.

‘So I met someone last night,’ he began, picking the words carefully. ‘We danced, we had fun, it was nice. Then he had to run off, and he called me by me last name. Which I hadn’t told him.’

The response was immediate, and strangely gratifying; everyone traded looks, some angry, some worried, and Tooth nodded, biting her lip.

‘So, like Tooth said last night, I thought maybe - maybe he’d met me before? But I didn’t remember meeting anyone who looked like him. So I went back to the club. He’d acted like a regular, ye know? The bartender knew his drink without asking, they talked like they’d known each other a while. I was hoping -’ Aster huffed a bit, annoyed at the way his voice had faltered. ‘I was hoping that he could tell me more about Jack, maybe it would ring some bells. And if it didn’t, it would at least point me in the right direction. Feels like I’m chasing roos all over the paddock.’

‘And?’ Tooth prompted.

‘And he didn’t know him. Didn’t recognise the name. Didn’t remember him.’

That had a much more profound effect on the others; Aster saw concern, confusion, and then saw Tooth bite her lip.

‘Have you considered…’ she began slowly, and Aster sighed.

‘If ye’ve thought of it, I’ve probably considered it in the past few hours,’ he said, and slumped forward, elbows on his knees. ‘All the crazy things, even. Maybe he’s a stalker. Maybe’s he’s a spook. Maybe I made him up. I don’t know. All I know,’ Aster swallowed, and looked up at his friends. ‘I know he felt real. I know I spent that time _somewhere._ I even think it had to have been the same club we started out in. I just don’t know how he knew me name, how he could have disappeared like he did.’

‘He disappeared?’ Nick repeated.

‘He - er, we said goodbye, he told me he thought we’d meet again, and then he ran onto the dancefloor and I couldn’t see him anymore,’ Aster said, glossing over the details a little. ‘Jack’s got white hair, reckon I shouldn’tve missed him with even a quick squizz about.’

‘There were a lot of people there,’ Isolde pointed out.

Tooth, however, had a little smile on her face; Aster groaned at the sight of it.

‘Tooth. I am begging ye, do not make a fuss about it.’

‘I’m pretty sure you’re forgetting something,’ she sang, and looked entirely too cheerful for someone who last night had been certain Jack was a dangerous stalker.

‘I am not,’ Aster protested, lying through his teeth.

‘Really? Was the kiss that forgettable?’

Aster scowled. ‘I said no such - ah, bugger.’

‘You kissed him?’ Natalia said, and she was smiling now too.

‘He kissed me,’ Aster mumbled, and kept his eyes on Tooth’s carpeting.

‘Well, then, Jack must be real!’ Nick boomed. ‘Ghost cannot kiss you.’

‘Could still be a stalker,’ Aster pointed out. ‘Could still have made him up.’

‘Aster,’ Nick said, eyes twinkling, ‘if you had thought him dangerous, crazy, you would not have let him kiss you in first place.’

‘Ugh,’ Aster groaned, dropping his face into his hand. ‘I shouldn’tve said anything to ye lot, I’ll never live it down now. And I still could’ve made him up - hallucinated the whole thing.’

‘Perhaps,’ Nick said, nodding. ‘But I do not think so.’

‘Well…’ Tooth said, biting her lip. ‘How come we couldn’t find him, if he was on the floor? Why didn’t any of us see Jack?’

No one had an answer for that.

‘Well,’ Isolde said, pulling their long dark hair up into a ponytail, ‘we’ll have to see what happens tonight. Chances are you won’t see him at all. You don’t know where we’re going, so there’s no chance you could have told him.’

‘It would be dreadfully unlikely,’ Tooth agreed.

‘If he’s stalking me,’ Aster pointed out, ‘wouldn’t he know?’

‘Still haven’t told you where we’re going, and this time,’ Tooth said, eyes bright, ‘You’ll ride with Sandy. He won’t be able to find you, if he is.’ She looked at him. ‘But, last night…’

‘I know.’

‘You said it didn’t feel like that. You said he didn’t feel dangerous.’

‘I know what I said,’ Aster sighed. ‘I still feel the same way. But I’m not sure, and to give ye the drum, I’m not even sure he’s -’

‘If you are scared you are hallucinating,’ Natalia said, voice firm, ‘we will keep an eye on you tonight. If we do not lose sight of you, you cannot disappear. And we will notice if you start talking to thin air.’

‘She’s right,’ Isolde said, nodding their head. ‘We can do that.’

‘I will do it,’ Sandy said, his soft voice soothing. ‘We hate clubs anyway. It is no trouble for me.’

‘Good, we have a plan,’ Tooth said. ‘So, everyone ready?’

‘As I’ll ever be,’ Aster replied.

The complicated feeling in his chest - uncertainty, apprehension, and a tiny flickering hope that he was firmly ignoring - was heavy, and only heavier when he stood up and followed his friends out the door.

  


Aster sighed, long and low, the sound utterly lost in the music.

He really ought to have suspected there was something faulty in their plan. Namely, that it was a plan at all. Historically, anything they as a group agreed would work tended to bodge itself up.

It had been an hour and a half since they arrived at Miasma, and it had been a long, _long_ hour and a half. First, Nick and Natalia had scarpered onto the dancefloor, which was nearly the size of Club Antilles’, and Aster hadn’t seen them since. Then, Tooth and Isolde had been lured off - Tooth said something about the DJ, but he hadn’t caught the whole sentence. Aster couldn’t blame her, precisely; the music, while not Aster’s usual jazz fare, was pleasant in its own right. It wasn’t so bass heavy that it was hard to pick out the rest of the music, and the samples bounced from genre to genre - Aster wasn’t sure, but he thought he’d heard Ella Fitzgerald’s voice. It was good. As good as club music could be, anyway.

Sandy had been perfectly happy to sit with Aster, signing back and forth - an old trick they’d picked up in college, when they’d wanted to talk but were in a place where Sandy’s voice just couldn’t compete. They’d remained in the booth for about twenty or so minutes past when Isolde and Tooth had gone before, to their surprise, a woman approached them, signing a quick hello.

She and Sandy had talked back and forth in sign, much more quickly than Aster was used to - he mostly picked up that she was deaf, and had seen them from across the way, and hoped that she wasn’t interrupting. Her name was Maria.

Aster wasn’t blind, and could see that Sandy was all but heart-eyed. Sandy didn’t date very often, as he was rarely interested in anyone at all romantically, and never sexually. So when she signed if he’d like to dance with her (the bass was strong enough to feel, Aster knew), and Sandy began to refuse, he’d broken in.

 _It’s alright,_ he signed, and Sandy gave him a concerned look. _We’ve not seen anything, and I’m feeling fine. Go enjoy yourself._

Sandy still hesitated, but Aster waved him off, and so off he went with Maria.

Which would have been fine, but then the wolves descended.

Aster had been sipping at his drink, some fruity thing Tooth had ordered for him cheekily, before he could ask for something less ridiculous. To his intense annoyance, he actually liked the damn thing.

‘Waiting on anyone?’

For a second, Aster’s heart skipped - but the voice was all wrong, the cadence entirely different. He looked up, and found a man with close-cropped dark hair leering at him.

The night before, when Jack had sidled up to him, Aster had called the look on his face hungry. If that was true, then this man looked _starving,_ ravenous, and it was distinctly unnerving.

‘I am,’ Aster replied tersely, only half-lying. No matter how unlikely it was, he knew why he’d agreed to come out tonight; he knew his own mind well enough. He wanted to know. He wanted to believe that Jack had been right. He wanted to see him again.

‘Are you sure you don’t want some company in the meantime?’ the man asked, leaning in. He smelled unpleasantly of a strong cologne, and Aster wrinkled his nose.

‘Yeah, I’m deadset that I don’t,’ he replied flatly. ‘Find someone who wants yer company.’

The man scowled. ‘Prick,’ he said, and walked off. Aster was unperturbed by it. There was always a bloke who hated hearing no for an answer; he looked the type who would have pushed it, if Aster didn’t look the way he did. He reckoned he could have tossed the bloke out the window if he had tried anything.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t the last.

With each successive attempt, Aster grew more tense; bloody oath, what about him said ‘yes, come chat me up’? He knew he had to be scowling, could feel the tension on his face, his grip on the fruity drink so tight his knuckles were paling. He didn’t want what any of these figjams were offering, each of them precisely like the other - looking for a quick root in the alley behind the club at best.

The memory of Jack (so forward, so flirtatious, so self-confident; and yet charming, gentle, kind) was like a sunspot in Aster’s eyes - impossible to ignore, to see past. It was ridiculous. It had been a few hours’ dance the night before, a kiss that had lasted less than thirty seconds.

It had been the most exciting thing to happen to Aster in years, and he was furious with himself that he was sitting here, waiting for a spectre who might not even be _real._ For all Aster knew, his own loneliness had conjured Jack from the depths of his mind.

Never mind that Jack in no way resembled any of Aster’s uni boyfriends. Never mind that Aster had never dated someone more than a year younger than himself. If it was a fantasy, then Aster had to give his brain credit for being creative.

‘Hey, is this seat taken?’

Aster was at his limit.

‘Yes, it bloody well is, like I told the last five -’ he spat, then froze. Because Jack - _Jack,_ white-haired, blue-eyed, wryly smiling Jack - was sliding into the seat, and suddenly Aster couldn’t make himself care that Jack might well be a hallucination or a crazy stalker, because he was _here._ ‘...blokes,’ he finished weakly.

‘That many, huh?’ Jack asked, setting his elbows on the booth table and balancing his chin in his graceful hands. ‘Thought I saw a couple. They giving you a hard time?’

‘Not particularly,’ Aster snorted. ‘Bunch of puffed up pigeons. Tell ‘em to go blow themselves and they scarper right quick.’

Jack laughed, eyes crinkling at the corners. ‘Yes, the big intimidating Bunny,’ he chuckled. ‘With your brooding scowl and your Slippery Nipple.’

‘What?’ Aster asked, mortified for a moment.

‘Your drink?’

‘I didn’t order it for meself,’ Aster protested, still a bit embarrassed; he’d not exactly been prepared to hear the word _nipple_ out of Jack’s mouth.

Jack’s eyes - it wasn’t a _flash,_ precisely. Jack’s eyes didn’t radiate their own light, bright as they were. But there was a strange cast to them as he smiled again. ‘Aw, you let someone else buy you a drink? Thought that was our thing, Bunny.’

Aster flushed. His dark skin hid it, but he had the feeling Jack knew, anyway. ‘Me friend Tooth,’ he said. ‘She’s here with her partner.’ He wasn’t sure why he felt the need to say that.

Well, that was a lie. The way Jack’s eyes almost fair lit up at the titbit of information made Aster’s stomach swoop; he’d been probing, then. He’d _wanted_ to know if Aster had someone.

‘Well, then, will you let me buy you another one?’ Jack asked, grinning; his eyes flicked to a watch on his wrist, nothing flashy, a silver-coloured band and a blue-black face. ‘Yours is almost finished.’

‘Honestly, I’d rather not,’ Aster said, and Jack’s face fell before he added, ‘I’m not much of a drinker. Can hold me liquor, but it’s not a skill I want to show off tonight.’

‘But you _do_ want to show off,’ Jack pointed out. Aster ducked his head; Jack had a gift for turning phrases to his advantage. It would be more impressive if Aster wasn’t too busy being so _affected_ by it. ‘I’ll buy you a soda, then. The bartender here can’t mix a good drink to save his life, anyway.’

‘Ye don’t have to,’ Aster replied. ‘I can get it meself.’

‘I know,’ Jack smiled. ‘That’s not the point. It’s traditional to buy the handsome man you’re hitting on a drink.’

Aster snorted, feeling warm all over. ‘Well, if ye insist I’ll take a Coke,’ he said, ‘but I’m going to buy ye a drink one of these days.’

‘And last night you were so certain we’d never see each other again,’ Jack teased, standing up. ‘I’ll be right back.’

His words jolted Aster, but before he could formulate a question, much less pose it, Jack had disappeared into the throng. Aster and Sandy had taken a booth near the back of the club, separated from the bar by the dance floor, and Aster cursed himself for a fool. Not only had he let Jack distract him from asking some questions that would _clear things up, goddamn it,_ he’d gone and let him disappear before he could get one of his friends nearby to confirm if Aster was just talking to himself or not.

He honestly half-expected Sandy to come back just after Jack left, because that would be his ridiculous luck, but no such thing happened. He wasn’t sure if he was disappointed or relieved by that.

Five minutes passed, then ten; Aster’s heart was sinking. Jack had been gone a while. If he’d ever been there in the first place.

‘Well, hey there,’ he heard, and he couldn’t stifle his groan as he realised _yet another man_ had come up to try his luck.

It was a built bloke when Aster turned, not as tall as himself but as broad, with ginger hair braided back from his face. He at least looked pleasant, compared to the others, but he wasn’t _Jack._

‘Sorry, mate, but I’m not interested,’ he said, before the bloke could speak again.

The man frowned. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked, and his voice was pleasant, too. ‘You can tell me to buzz off, no problem, but I was just going to ask if you wanted a drink, maybe a dance.’

‘He’s already got both.’

Aster sucked in a surprised breath, and relief flooded him as Jack came around the man, carrying two glasses. Jack was scowling at the man, and Aster wanted to be annoyed at it on principle - he wasn’t Jack’s, he wasn’t _anyone’s,_ he could damn well take care of himself - but, well. It was hard to be annoyed when he was trying to keep from letting his interested cock become any more aware of the situation.

Jack set the glasses down and turned his back to Aster, staring the man down.

The bloke lifted his hands, a rueful smile on his face. ‘Didn’t know he was taken,’ he said apologetically. ‘Can’t blame a guy for trying.’

The tense line of Jack’s back, visible beneath a tight, dark tee, relaxed a little. ‘Really can’t,’ Jack replied with a shrug, and the man ambled off.

‘I could have handled that meself,’ Aster said, and managed to sound properly irritated about it; it was taking some effort, but his body was calming down.

‘I know you could,’ Jack replied as he turned; he gave Aster a blatant up and down that almost ruined all of his careful work. ‘You could give anyone in here a run for their money, but you knew that already.’

‘If ye think that,’ Aster argued, ‘then why’d ye step in?’

Jack smiled, shameless. ‘Let me ask you a question,’ he said, and leaned in; with anyone else, Aster would have called it uncomfortably near. With Jack, he had the fleeting thought that it wasn’t near enough, close enough their noses were almost brushing and Aster could feel Jack’s breath over his lips. ‘Just picture this for me, would you? You finally get to buy me that drink. We’re sitting down, we’re having a good time, you go to buy it from the bar. And when you come back…’ Jack tilted his head, and for a heart-stopping second Aster thought he was going to kiss him. ‘Someone’s flirting with me. About to take your seat, even though I’ve just told him no. How does that make you feel?’

Aster managed to think about it for precisely one second before a possessive anger _he had no right to, damn it,_ rose up in his chest. It must have shown in his face, because Jack leaned back, looking satisfied.

‘Exactly,’ he said, and flopped into his seat with more grace than a ‘flop’ should ever have.

Aster picked up his glass, a little shaken by the depth of the anger that had just filled him - just at the _thought_ of someone else making Jack laugh, someone else making his eyes flash.

‘Careful, Cottontail, or you’re going to break the glass,’ Jack said, sounding amused.

Aster realised his knuckles were pale around the glass, and he took a quick drink before setting it down.

‘Are you always like this?’ Jack asked, swirling the ice in his glass. Aster was unsure if there was rum in his or not.

‘Like what?’ Aster returned, a bit confused by the question.

‘You just seem - on edge,’ Jack said.

Aster didn’t know the answer himself, and so shrugged. Jack tilted his head, and his hair flopped over, but didn’t quite reach his eyes.

‘Yer hair is shorter,’ Aster said, then cursed himself in his head.

Jack lifted a hand to brush the hair away, a smile just this side of smug curving his mouth. ‘You noticed?’

‘I - er,’ Aster said haltingly, and had no idea what he was going to say.

Jack opened his mouth to reply, and Aster knew it was going to be teasing and flirtatious and he couldn’t wait to hear it, couldn’t wait to keep dancing this game. Then, Jack looked down at his watch.

He cursed. ‘Shit, I’ll be right back,’ he said, standing up. ‘Don’t go anywhere - I’d hate to lose you in the crowd,’ he added, throwing in a cheerful wink.

‘No, don’t ye dare -’ Aster began, but he’d already disappeared.

Aster dropped his head into his hands. Crikey. Twice, in one night, he’d let Jack slip through his fingers.

The music pounding overhead was slowly turning towards something darker, richer in tone with each song. He didn’t know any of them, but something about them remained familiar, all the same - the thick but not overpowering bass, the mellow melodies. Sampled voices and overlaid harmonies.

The lights were dimming some, too, he realised; warm lights in tones of red and yellow took over the light display that every club seemed to require, and soon there was little more than shadows in the corners, the dancers starkly contrasted between where the light hit them and the shadowed silhouettes of their bodies. Some kind of fog machine was turned on, and Aster realised that must be related to the club name. Miasma, indeed.

‘Aster.’

Aster looked over from where he’d been watching the dancers, startled, to see Sandy and his new friend had returned. ‘Lo,’ he replied, signing _hello_ at the same time - it would be unpardonably rude to leave Maria out of the conversation.

 _Aster,_ Sandy signed, fingers trembling as he spelled the name out, _who was here?_

Aster started, then looked over to the other side of the table, where Jack had left his glass. It was still there, moisture on the outside running down to pool on the plastic surface, and Aster swallowed.

 _Jack,_ he signed back. _You can see the glass?_

Maria looked between them curiously as Sandy replied, _Yes. Are you sure it was -_

 _I’m sure,_ Aster interrupted. _He ran off a bit ago, don’t know where he went._

Sandy looked a little frustrated at that; Aster didn’t blame him, but for his part he was filled with relief. The glass was still there. Sandy had seen it. Aster might not be entirely mad after all.

 _I’m sorry,_ Maria signed, _but can I ask? Who’s Jack?_

Sandy looked at Aster, and Aster sighed. _A mystery, at this point, and not one I’ll solve if he keeps running off,_ he signed, putting some extra huff behind each one.

Maria laughed, the sound a little toneless, then signed, _Well, good luck, Sherlock Holmes. I’m about to head home._

 _Thank you,_ Aster replied, smiling a bit. She was good-natured, cheerful and kind; he hoped this worked out for Sandy, at least. It would be nice if _one_ of them got something out of this bloody club crawl.

 _And thank you,_ Maria signed to Sandy, _for a wonderful dance. Can I give you my number? Maybe next time we can meet somewhere a little less dark._

Aster realised she must be leaving because she was having a hard time seeing the signs. Sandy nodded eagerly, pulling out his phone, and they traded numbers; Aster hid his smile behind a sip of Coke.

 _Let me walk you out,_ Sandy signed to her, then looked at Aster. _You’ll be fine until I get back?_

 _I’m an adult,_ Aster replied, exasperated. _Can take care of myself._

Sandy nodded, and the two of them left Aster at the table.

Another few minutes passed, a song change, and Aster stared down at his drink. Jack had disappeared, Sandy’s new friend had left; when Sandy returned, Aster was going to suggest they duck out early. Tooth couldn’t complain if it was Sandy asking.

‘Miss me?’ Jack asked, voice coming from behind Aster, and then there was a warm weight across Aster’s shoulders, Jack’s arms slung across them, leaning over the outside of the booth.

Aster should have been startled by it. He should have hated the invasion of his space.

Instead, he relaxed back, so relieved he almost couldn’t stand it.

‘Sorry about that,’ Jack said, his breath sliding past Aster’s ear and making him shiver. ‘Didn’t mean to be gone so long.’

‘Glad ye’re back,’ Aster replied, the words out of his mouth before he could think about them, and Jack’s laughter in his ear shouldn’t have been so goddamn _seductive,_ he was practically giggling.

‘Here, come on,’ Jack said, standing up and pulling away from Aster; he missed the warmth almost before it was gone, despite the heat of the club and the cloying humidity of the fog. He walked around to stand beside the table and held out his hand, smiling at Aster. ‘I want to show you something.’

He knew he should protest. He knew he should stall for time, just for a few minutes, Sandy would be back soon and able to confirm or deny what was happening -

But Jack’s smile, the light of his eyes, the invitation of his extended hand, were too tempting. And there was a heavy counterpart that gave the temptation heft, an emotion Aster was carefully pretending wasn’t there.

Aster took his hand, and let him pull him to his feet. Jack didn’t hesitate once, despite the height and weight difference, and smiled brightly up at him before tangling their fingers together.

‘Come on,’ he said, and began to tow Aster away from the table.

He followed him, through the thick mob of dancers and the haze of the fog machine, back past the blacked out DJ booth and towards a back sort of entrance.

‘Are we allowed back here?’ Aster asked, apprehensive. His voice felt too loud, without the bulk of the music to mask it. Jack’s hand squeezed his.

‘Don’t worry about it, we’re fine,’ he said. His voice, without the filter of the music, was somehow _nicer._ It was fuller and deeper, though still nowhere near as deep as Aster’s; it held more tones and more nuances, laid bare in the relative silence.

 _And ye’re being ridiculous,_ Aster thought to himself furiously, but it didn’t change the way his heart felt like it had doubled its speed.

Jack led him up four flights of stairs, to a door with a flickering red EXIT sign above it. ‘Hold on,’ Jack said, letting go of Aster’s hand and stepping up to the door. He fiddled with it a moment, then pushed it open.

‘Did ye just jimmy it open?’ Aster asked incredulously.

‘Nope,’ Jack said, but his grin was pure mischief when he looked over his shoulder.

‘Ye’re going to get us locked up, ye loony,’ Aster replied, and tried to hate how it came out fond instead of outraged.

He stepped out onto the roof, Jack holding the door politely, and sucked in a breath in surprise.

‘They haven’t opened it up yet, it’s still new,’ Jack said from behind him, ‘but what do you think?’

The rooftop, flat and railed, had been transformed into an eating space, small tables and a platform for live performers at one end. What made it unique amongst rooftop setups, in Aster’s humble opinion, was all the green.

Everywhere that it could be squeezed in, plants blossomed forth with flowers and large leaves. He recognised species of ivy and orchids, tropical grasses, clematis winding around the trellis roof, and fairy lights were strung about, round lightbulbs like little stars. Even the water left from that morning’s deluge only added to the effect, crystalline dew dripping and sparkling on the leaves.

‘S’beautiful,’ Aster whispered.

‘It’s a bit cliche,’ Jack said, coming up to stand beside Aster, ‘but I like it, too. They’re pretty sure they’ll be able to make bank by doing small parties, live bands, that kind of thing.’

‘Reckon,’ Aster agreed. ‘Specially if it looks like this.’

‘Glad you like it,’ Jack said, and took Aster’s hand, fingers finding their places between Aster’s own. He began to walk, and as Aster followed, he started talking.

‘Sorry for dragging you around, but you looked like you were going to murder something if you had to stay in there much longer,’ he said, leading Aster through the tables and the greenery. ‘You go to an awful lot of nightclubs for someone who says they don’t dance.’

‘Told ye, me friends have dragged me on a club crawl,’ Aster protested. ‘Haven’t got a choice, to give ye the good oil.’

‘Really,’ Jack replied, sounding like he was trying not to laugh. ‘And that’s why you bit my head off when I asked if the seat was taken, right? And then let me sit down?’

‘I didn’t expect to see ye,’ Aster defended. ‘Ye caught me off guard.’

‘You didn’t expect to see me,’ Jack repeated, and tossed a look over his shoulder that made Aster’s mouth dry out. ‘But you were still saving me a seat?’

‘Who said the seat was for ye?’

‘You did. When you let me sit down.’

Aster huffed, but - well. He’d known he was waiting, known he wanted to see Jack again, no matter how impossible it had seemed at the time.

Jack’s smile at the noise was like how Aster imagined sharks smiled when they’d caught the scent of blood in the water.

Once they were past the tables, there was some kind of open area meant for dancing, which Jack towed him right past; then, hidden amongst the dangling leaves, there was another, different rooftop access (presumably for the bands, Aster thought) and a number of benches. Jack ignored these and let go of Aster’s hand, walking up to the railing instead and leaning on it. A breeze was coming up, and through the heavy scent of city pollution and car exhaust, Aster thought he could smell the ocean.

‘Sorry the air isn’t as fresh as it could be,’ Jack said, looking out over the city. The club was only two, three stories tall, but this neighbourhood was particularly squat, not one Aster had ever had reason to visit before. The centre of the city, with her glittering lights and skyscrapers, was neither far off nor close; it sat firmly in the middle distance, impossible to ignore. Aster walked up and leaned on the rail to Jack’s right. If it was between Jack and the rooftop access, then that was pure coincidence and Aster would never admit otherwise.

‘Better than nothing,’ Aster replied. ‘Not used to the city, then?’

He should be asking the important questions, he knew. He _knew_ it. But… God help him, he was afraid. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to know one way or the other. This atmosphere between them was fragile, and so Aster told himself, _a little longer. A little longer, and I’ll ask him._

Jack dropped his head forward before looking at Aster from under his fringe and his eyelashes both. ‘That obvious, huh?’

‘Not really,’ Aster shrugged. ‘After a while in the city, though, ye stop noticing the air’s not what it could be.’

Jack laughed a bit. ‘I think I’ll always notice. Even the stars aren’t there.’ He gestured to the sky, the orange-grey-blue haze that served as the heavens of any city in the nighttime. ‘There’s Polaris, and you can see Mars and Venus sometimes, but I’m used to a lot more than that. You can’t even see Ursa Majora. Well, not all of it, anyway.’

‘Ye like the stars, then?’ Aster asked, a little surprised. It was a concrete part of Jack that until now hadn’t existed; another piece of him Aster couldn’t have dreamed up, like the glass on the table.

‘Doesn’t everyone, just a little?’ Jack returned, eyes twinkling in the city lights. Aster wondered if they would be more beautiful under starlight, and then wondered if he’d ever get a chance to know.

‘Have to admit to not paying too much attention to them,’ Aster said instead. ‘I spend most of me time focussed on the dirt.’

‘Why am I not surprised?’ Jack teased, and that could have been a perfect segue, the perfect chance to ask a question, but instead Aster laughed. Jack was watching him as he did, face curious and kind, and _hungry_ again, the way he had looked the night before. Aster swallowed as Jack turned to face him, and did the same.

‘Can I ask about the scar?’ Jack said, and Aster jolted as Jack’s hand came up, thumb sweeping over the thick skin bisecting Aster’s upper lip. ‘Kind of thought it was where you got the nickname Bunny, at first. What, you fight a bear and win?’

‘Cleft lip as a tot,’ Aster said, caught off guard. ‘Took a while to save up to have surgery to fix it, and so I got the scar later in life than I ought’ve. Wouldn’t heal as invisible as it would had I gotten it earlier.’

Jack nodded, looking serious. ‘Not that that’s not important,’ Jack murmured, ‘but I think it looks cool, at least. Really makes you look like you’ve earned the nickname, Bun-bun.’

‘Ye know exactly where I got the nickname,’ Aster replied, then froze. They were skirting that invisible edge now, between mystery and knowing, and he knew instantly that he regretted it. God, but he had it bad if he was willing to never know, to always exist like this, if it kept Jack near.

Jack’s eyes widened a moment, then settled into a hooded look. Aster hadn’t expected that, the way Jack stepped into his space, more so than he had been; there was less than an inch between them, and Aster knew it was nowhere near enough distance to pretend he wasn’t reacting the way he was.

‘I do, do I?’ Jack asked, voice soft, and his thumb swept to the side, the exploratory touch becoming a cupped hand on his cheek. ‘Guess I do.’

‘Jack…’ Aster began, and then had no idea what he wanted to say.

‘Aster.’

Jack kissed like he danced, spontaneous, free. It was impossible to tell when he would break away, when his tongue would dart out to slide along Aster’s lip but never further, and Aster was left to chase each kiss. He felt that was only appropriate, considering.

He didn’t even notice Jack had been walking him backwards until he bumped into a wall - the wall of the rooftop access. He stumbled a bit, ending up in a lean against the wall that wasn’t uncomfortable but was certainly unexpected.

‘Better,’ Jack said, sounding satisfied, and draped himself flat against Aster. He was using the lean to equalise the height difference, Aster realised, so neither of them had to bend too far to reach one another; it was clever, more strategic thought than Aster had thought someone capable of in the middle of a kiss as involved as theirs. Jack laid another kiss on his lips, this one easier to reach, his hands sliding up and back to tilt Aster’s head just so, fingers tangled in the wiry grey curls.

The weight of Jack along his entire body, the wall against his back - together they communicated a very different kind of kiss, and Aster couldn’t resist the invitation there. He somehow doubted anyone could.

He had no real concept of time, only hazy guesses. Abstracts couldn’t hold up to the anchor of reality that was the way Jack had hooked his knee behind Aster’s. The pressure against his cock, finally given free reign to be as interested as it liked, and the blatant hardness Aster could feel pressed alongside his was the oldest question in the book. Aster answered the only way available to him, his mouth occupied with Jack’s clever tongue, and gripped Jack’s thigh, hitching him higher and creating a better angle for the little rocking motions they were trading. From there, it was just a natural consequence, that Jack would end up with his legs wrapped around Aster’s waist and rolling their hips together, gasping for breath.

It wasn’t that Aster didn’t feel the weight - Jack was a skinny thing, almost a foot shorter, but he was still a full grown man. He felt the weight, the strain on his muscles; he just didn’t _care._ Jack wasn’t the heaviest thing he’d ever held, and the way he felt, moving almost desperately against Aster, was _fantastic._

‘Shit shit shit,’ Jack was muttering, fingers tangled and gripping at Aster’s hair, ‘you could probably fuck me just like this, couldn’t you -’

Aster groaned and bucked up helplessly, because _god_ that was a beautiful thought, but then Jack was unfolding his legs from Aster’s waist and stepping back down, and Aster was horrified to hear an honest-to-god _whine_ from his own throat. He’d have been satisfied to stay that way until his arms gave out.

The teasing he’d expected never came, though, Jack sinking down farther and hitting his knees before him, and Aster stopped breathing. He wouldn’t - he _wasn’t -_

But Jack was flicking open the button to Aster’s jeans and dragging the zipper down, tugging his tee out of the way, and his face was both determined and delighted, like he’d never done anything so wonderful in his entire life and he was going to do it the best he possibly could.

‘Fuck, you’re gorgeous,’ Jack breathed across the head of Aster’s cock once he had it free, and then opened his mouth.

It wasn’t some fantasy blowjob, where Jack sucked him down to the root at the first go. His hand covered what his mouth couldn’t, and his mouth could only go about halfway down; but his hand gave short, firm strokes, and his tongue kept swiping under the head, dragging against the foreskin, and he was moaning like _he_ was the one getting blown against the wall.

Aster just focussed on holding his hips still and not coming embarrassingly quickly, biting his lip and breathing harshly through his nose. One hand was splayed flat against the wall, fingers opening and closing to try and distract himself, and his other was in Jack’s hair, who had pressed up into the the touch when Aster first laid it there. It was less a guide and more of an anchor; Jack was absolutely in control, and they both knew it.

Despite himself, it was only a few minutes (if it was even that long) before he groaned deep in his throat and finally bucked as he came, making Jack groan back.

Jack let Aster’s softening cock slide out on his tongue and leaned back, still on his knees. He spread his legs, scrambling to open his own jeans. Aster could still see spots of milky white on his lips as he wrapped a hand around himself and began to stroke, tilting his head back with a drawn out sigh, and while that was a sight that would haunt Aster’s dreams, that wasn’t what he wanted.

He dropped to his knees as well, straddling Jack’s spread thighs, and knocked his hand away. He caught Jack’s chin and tilted it up, licking himself off Jack’s lip before kissing him as filthy as he knew how, tongue and teeth, hand sliding to the back of his neck to support him. His other hand he wrapped around Jack’s cock, who moaned, rocked up twice, and came with a cry that Aster swallowed in his mouth.

It had taken all of maybe five minutes, and it was still the most fantastic sex Aster had ever had in his life.

They kissed a few minutes more, the kisses turning softer and sweeter as they went, Jack’s come cooling between them, their pants undone and their clothes in disarray. Aster didn’t care.

Finally, Jack pulled away with one last lingering, closemouthed kiss, and smiled up at Aster, expression blissed out and hair a wreck. ‘Can you get up?’ he asked, nudging Aster’s nose with his own. ‘Only, my knees are killing me.’

Aster swore and scrambled up, before holding a hand down to Jack and pulling him to his feet. He wasn’t sure what the etiquette was for roots at the club (it had been a long time since he was inclined in that direction, and even then he’d never done anything like _this.)_ Somehow, though, he doubted it involved the gentle way they tended to each other, not trading words but doing up pants, adjusting shirts to hide stains, a casual intimacy with each other’s bodies that made no sense but felt absolutely right.

Then Jack caught sight of his watch, and yelped.

‘Fuck, I’ve only got two minutes -’ he sputtered, audibly horrified.

To Aster’s shock, Jack flung his arms over Aster’s neck and dragged him down into a brief, desperate kiss.

‘I’m so fucking sorry, I have to go -’ he said, words almost slurring together with his speed, and kissed the corner of Aster’s mouth. ‘I’m sorry, I keep running off, but I have to go -’

‘But -’

‘No time, Bunny, I’m so goddamned sorry,’ and then Jack released him and turned, fair hurdling the benches and tables in his way. Aster watched, stunned, both because _christ_ Jack was beautiful, fast and athletic in a streamlined sense, in the way anyone was who was active for the joy of it and not the aestheticism, and because -

 _‘Fuck,’_ Aster said feelingly, but Jack had already disappeared through the door, and there was no way Aster could’ve caught him, even though he himself was hardly a slow runner.

He’d let him go, again. He’d just rooted around with Jack on the roof of a club, and hadn’t even asked his last name, his number, _anything._ Come morning, Jack would be just as much a ghost as he had been after the night before. And there had been no promise to see one another again.

Aster felt sick.

He picked his way over to the door and down the stairs; when he re-entered the club’s public areas, he saw that it was past last call, the dancers trailing off the floor as the music began to fade down.

‘Aster!’

Sandy’s voice was stunningly loud - almost as loud as Nick’s normal speaking voice - and he hustled over, his face sick with worry. ‘Aster, you are okay,’ he panted when he reached him, voice gone back to its soft regularity. ‘I thought - but when I came back, you were gone -’

Aster winced. ‘Ah, yeah. Sorry about that, Sandy. I didn’t even think.’

‘It was him, wasn’t it?’ Sandy pressed, already having reached up and taken Aster’s elbow and dragging him towards the exit. ‘It was Jack.’

‘It was,’ Aster admitted.

 _‘Bunny!’_ Tooth cried, and dashed towards them. Her makeup was smeared, and Aster realised with some horror that she’d been crying. ‘You asshole!’ she hissed, even as she wrapped him up in a hug. He hugged her gingerly back, guilt thick as tar in his gut. ‘What did we say? _Don’t disappear!_ How is that difficult to follow?!’

‘Babe,’ Isolde said softly, and Tooth nodded, letting Aster go.

‘Come on,’ she said, taking Aster’s other elbow, Sandy have reclaimed his left. ‘We’re leaving, and you’re going to talk, and then _if you leave anything out I will stab you.’_

Aster winced as he was dragged, his friends like a wall around him; he couldn’t even turn, see if he could find even a flash of white on the low-lit dance floor, still gently fogged. ‘Er,’ he said, knowing he was about to get the ribbing of his life, ‘reckon ye might not want all of the details.’

Tooth almost tripped out the door at that. ‘Are you _serious?!’_ she screeched at least two times louder than Aster felt it really merited, given that she was only a foot or so away from his ear. ‘You _actually_ -’

‘Well, shout it to the whole street, why don’t ye,’ Aster interrupted hastily. He then sighed, then added, ‘can we at least get back to the cars before ye give me the interrogation?’

Passersby almost dove out of the way as Tooth dragged him forward, the rest of their group trailing behind, and then they were at Sandy’s car and she all but shoved him to sit on the bonnet. ‘Now,’ she said, and honestly, her voice was much scarier when she went quiet, he should tell her one of these days. ‘Tell me you didn’t wander off, _again,_ and find the crazy stalker guy, and then _sleep_ with him!’

‘He’s not a crazy stalker,’ Aster muttered.

‘That is _not_ the part of the sentence I need you to deny,’ she said, stroppy as anything.

‘Have we at least agreed,’ Nick said from behind Tooth, unusually hesitant, ‘that he is in fact real person?’

‘Did anyone see him?!’ Tooth asked, whirling on the others. ‘Sandy, you were supposed to be with him!’

Sandy held up his hands, looking guilty, and that wasn’t fair. ‘No, Tooth, don’t blame him,’ Aster said, reaching out and placing a hand on her shoulder. ‘I told him he could go dance.’

‘And then what? The stalker found you?’

‘He’s _not a stalker,_ Tooth. And yes. He showed up, disappeared, came back with a drink and scared some other bloke off - _not in a bad way, Tooth, do not start with me -_ and then ran off again. Sandy came back, said he was walking his new pash out to her car -’

Sandy pulled a horrified face as Nick and Tooth turned to him slowly.

‘Met new friend, did you?’ Nick said, sly smile stretching over his lips.

‘Aster,’ Sandy said very evenly, ‘you are dead to me.’

‘Guess ye’re driving a corpse home, then,’ Aster replied, relieved that for the moment, the heat wasn’t on him.

It didn’t last, as Tooth turned back. ‘So Sandy didn’t see him either?’

‘No. But he’d left his glass behind.’

Tooth threw her hands into the air. ‘Are you serious?’ she demanded, and Aster was a little amused that she sounded much more frustrated than he did. ‘That’s it? What is this guy, Cinderella?!’

‘I don’t know,’ Aster admitted. ‘He came back after a while, when Sandy had left to bring _Maria_ -’ at least if he was going down, Sandy was going down with him, ‘out to her car. Said he wanted to show me something.’

‘And you went with him,’ Tooth said flatly. ‘Aster, what if he’s a serial killer? The _something_ could have been his personal collection of _eyeballs,_ for all you knew!’

Aster choked. ‘Are ye - are ye _serious,_ Tooth?’ he said, flabbergasted. ‘What the hell have ye been watching on the telly lately? Isolde,’ he said, and their eyebrows went up. ‘Ye need to stop letting her watch all those crime shows, s’gonna make her go right troppo.’

Tooth flushed a dusky red. ‘It’s a legitimate concern, Aster!’

‘Eyeballs,’ Aster returned.

Tooth groaned feelingly, and turned to Isolde, who had already opened their arms for her to burrow into. ‘I can’t deal with him,’ she mumbled into their shoulder. ‘Nick, you handle him, I am going to _rip out his eyeballs myself_ if someone else doesn’t handle him.’

‘Ah,’ Natalia said, as hesitant as Nick. ‘Perhaps, I should…’ she shook her head, long blond hair waving in the breeze Aster had felt on the roof. ‘What happened then?’

‘He led me up to the roof -’

‘The _roof?!’_ Tooth shrieked, but the sound was muffled by Isolde’s neck.

Aster ignored her, for everybody’s sake. ‘It was… the club is apparently opening a live music venue?’ he said with a shrug. ‘S’not open yet, but it was bonzer. Practically a garden up there, looked a beaut.’

‘He took you up to the roof… to show you a garden?’ Natalia said slowly. She and Nick traded glances.

‘Yes,’ Aster confirmed. Then he had to look off to the side, stare down at the kerb, or make an absolute fool of himself. ‘We - er, yeah. Then he realised the time, said sorry about six times, kissed me again and scarpered before I could stop him.’

Tooth groaned into Isolde’s throat. ‘How,’ she said loudly, ‘did you manage to get a _goddamn Cinderella stalker?!’_

‘Pretty sure he’s not a stalker, mate,’ Aster said tiredly. ‘Since at this point it’s more me chasing him than the other way round.’

‘Take him home, Sandy,’ Tooth commanded. ‘Maybe tomorrow we can - I don’t know, come up with a plan, maybe.’

‘I have a plan,’ Aster replied, and everyone stopped.

‘You have… plan,’ Nick repeated. Aster did not appreciate the scepticism.

‘Yes, I have a plan.’

‘Your plans do not always come out as wished.’

‘Ye belt right up, Nicholas St. North, ye’re the one who said dyeing the fountain’s water supply wasn’t going to get into the drinking water.’

Nick chuckled, as did Tooth and Sandy; Natalia and Isolde looked at each other, a bit confused.

‘Do I want to ask?’ Isolde murmured, pressing their lips to Tooth’s forehead.

‘Not in the slightest,’ Tooth replied. ‘I’ll tell you later.’

After that, they parted ways, and Aster clambered into Sandy’s tiny car. He folded himself up best he could as Sandy got in beside him and started the engine; after a moment, though, they hadn’t moved, and Aster gave him a look.

‘What?’

‘I was just thinking,’ Sandy said, his voice almost drowned out by the engine. The engine wasn’t particularly loud; Sandy was just unusually soft. ‘He took you up to a garden, right?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Maybe it really is just a lucky coincidence that it was there,’ Sandy continued. ‘But, still… he knew enough about you to know that you would rather go up there than dance in the club.’

‘That doesn’t take much to figure out,’ Aster pointed out.

‘No,’ and Sandy smiled. ‘Might have been a guess. But he still took _you_ -’ and Sandy reached over to pat Aster’s knee, ‘- to a _garden._ He could not have picked a better place.’

‘Ye hush yer gob,’ Aster said, face hot. ‘I’m not that predictable.’

‘You really are,’ Sandy chuckled, and pulled out of the parking space.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I missed you all, too.


	3. Saturday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://8tracks.com/proser132/saturday-slip-side

**** Aster woke up slowly; normally, he would have opened on a Saturday, but he felt entitled to a day off, after the past few days, and had himself a bit of a lie-in.

The grey weather outside from the morning before had returned, painting his bedroom shades of the same colour. He lay on his bed, and stared up at the ceiling. He had no idea what time it was, had no inclination to turn his head and see.

Part of him wanted to write it off as a dream. A bad dream, a good dream - he wasn’t certain, yet. Jack’s laughter, Jack’s kisses, Jack’s eyes glittering in the city lights… those were all parts of a good dream, he knew.

But then, he wondered,  _ is it ever a good dream when ye wake up and ye’re aching? _

It was ridiculous. It was mad. And Aster wasn’t  _ quite _ round the bend far enough to say he was - in love, or something. He was pretty sure you couldn’t fall in love in just two days, much less two days in which you’ve really only managed about half a convo with the bloke you’re cracking onto. He knew himself, though, knew this feeling even though it hadn’t found him since his uni days. Knew what it could turn into.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, wiping sleep from his eyes; they ached, too, as if he hadn’t slept at all.

His eyes and his heart weren’t the only things aching, but he was stubbornly ignoring that. Trying to ignore it. Failing, really.

Only, god, but Aster  _ couldn’t _ remember the last time someone had touched him like that, fingers delicate on his lip and sure on his cock and so confident, so  _ wanting.  _ Jack had  _ wanted _ him, been desperate for him, far gone enough to  _ suck him off on a public roof. _ There were ego boosts, and then there were things like this, where it made Aster feel like he must be glowing from the inside out with the heady feeling. Jack had wanted him as badly as he had wanted Jack.

Then the soft kisses after, the gentle touches, the way he had looked so frustrated and regretful just before he ran -

Aster gave up ignoring the problem as a bad job, and reached down, palming himself. It took four strokes, quick and desperate, before his back arched and he came gasping out Jack’s name.

It was the second time since he’d come home that he’d gotten off, just to the memory.

He finally dragged himself out of bed, and his glance at clock made him groan; it was already ten past one.

He would take a shower. Then he would think. And he would get to the bottom of this, god help him, or he’d cark it from trying.

Aster could be patient for many things. This was not one of them.

  
  


‘Oh, my,’ Tooth said as he walked in the door. ‘You couldn’t have worn that on Friday?’

Aster paused. Looked down at himself. Dark jeans, near the same pair as the night before; black tee; black and grey button-up.

‘Er,’ he said slowly, ‘I… did?’

‘You most certainly did not,’ she replied primly. ‘Though the green overshirt was a good decision with your eyes, dear, black is a  _ very _ good look on you.’ She tilted her head, hair falling low. ‘Have you considered, oh, I don’t know. Tattoos?’

‘I have tattoos?’ Aster answered, confused.

‘What?’

‘Black ink tattoos,’ Aster confirmed. ‘Tooth, we’ve been mates for eleven years, and ye’re going to tell me ye never noticed?’

‘Well, they’d be a bit hard to see!’ Tooth protested, cheeks going a dark, deep red. ‘It’s not like you’re Snow White, here!’

_ ‘Tooth,’ _ Aster said, exasperated. ‘I’m fair certain it’s just that ye’re absentminded.’

‘Well, you’re not my type, I wouldn’t have been paying attention.’

‘Paying attention to what?’ Isolde asked, entering the living room. Aster was certain they hadn’t gone home the night before.

‘Would ye believe,’ Aster said, and grinned at Tooth, ‘that this woman has been me friend for over a decade, and she’s never noticed I have tattoos?’

Isolde blinked. ‘Well, yes,’ they said, and then over Tooth’s outraged squawking, added ‘but I’ve not seen you in anything but the longsleeves, so I suppose I wouldn’t have noticed, either.’

‘I do wear other clothes,’ Aster said, shucking the button up and setting it aside. Then he pulled off the tee.

‘We have  _ got _ to talk about your exhibitionism, Bunny, dear,’ Tooth said with an eyeroll. Aster rolled his eyes right back, and turned to Isolde.

‘Since ye’ll apparently be able to pick them out, here.’ He gestured, a little self-consciously, to the pair on his shoulder, the steep angles on his chest framing the flower motif on his breastbone, before turning to display the line of large Vs that centred on his spine, four in a row to the middle of his lower back.

‘To be fair to Tooth,’ Isolde said, their half-smile amused when Aster turned back, ‘they  _ are _ only a little darker than your skin.’

Aster gave them an unimpressed look. ‘They’re not obvious, but they’re not subtle, either. And Tooth’s dragged me to enough beach days, ye think she would have noticed, oh, the other  _ four hundred times she’s seen me with me shirt off.’ _

‘Shut up and put your shirt on, Bunny,’ Tooth huffed.

Aster had just reached for it when he heard Nick enter the house (evidently, he’d decided that knocking was something only done during the week, and now that it was Saturday he no longer had to bow to the rules of polite society). ‘Ah!’ Nick boomed, entering the room. ‘Are we comparing tattoos?’

‘No, we aren’t,’ Aster said firmly, and pulled his shirt on. Nick had some… interesting tattoo choices on his body, and Aster didn’t much intend to have to look at the face of the Coca Cola Santa Claus more often than he had to. It was well done, but he was certain the eyes followed him, and who the hell got _ Father Christmas  _ tattooed on his body?

‘You knew?’ Tooth asked, and Aster turned just in time to see the most hysterical expression of confusion cross Nick’s face.

‘That… I have tattoos?’

Aster snorted.

‘No, you ninny!’ Tooth sputtered. ‘That  _ Bunny _ has tattoos!’

‘He has had them since he lived in Australia. Since before we knew him!’ Nick gave Tooth a slow look. ‘You… did not know?’

‘I wasn’t exactly staring at his  _ chest!’ _

‘Or me back,’ Aster chimed in. ‘Or me arms.’

‘Shut  _ up,  _ Bunny!’

Sandy stepped out from behind Nick, visibly fighting laughter, and patted Tooth gently before taking a seat on the couch.

‘Where’s Natalia?’ Aster asked.

‘She has decided to stay home,’ Nick said with a shrug. ‘She is, and I quote here,  _ too tired to put up with excitement of third night dancing. _ After first two nights, I cannot place blame.’

Aster snorted, just as Isolde sighed loudly in what sounded like relief.

‘In which case, babe,’ they said, walking over and laying a kiss on Tooth’s cheek, ‘I’m staying in, too.’

‘What?’ Tooth said, turning. ‘Why?’

‘I’m tired,’ they replied simply. ‘Natalia has the right idea. Besides,’ and they smiled a half-smile that looked almost inappropriate for company. ‘I’ll be here when you get back.’

Tooth flushed again, but nodded. ‘Well, looks like it’ll be just like old times, tonight,’ she said, turning back to the others.

‘Ugh, I hope not,’ Aster shuddered. ‘Sandy should never be that drunk again. Thought we agreed to that.’

Isolde laughed, Nick chuckled, Tooth sighed and Sandy smiled sheepishly.

‘Where are we headed?’ Aster asked.

‘A club in the city centre - oh, thank you for reminding me, I got one-night parking passes for everyone,’ she said, and passed them out after digging them from her purse. ‘Just put them under your windshield, and they’ll let you through. Much easier than trying to find parking in some other garage, or on the street.’

‘Club Satellite,’ Aster read off the pink slip of paper. ‘Never heard of it.’

‘Not surprised, Bunny, dear,’ she sighed. ‘You’re hardly the local gossip. It’s fairly new, only a few years old, and very music-centric rather than  _ entirely  _ about the dancing. They’re very good, if I have to say. Some of my favourite DJs have gotten their starts there, or, well, their American starts, at least.’

‘Huh,’ Aster said. Trust Tooth to know her way around the city. ‘Well then, s’pose we ought to get headed. Don’t want ye to miss too much, they must’ve started by now.’

‘Actually, there’s two DJs tonight - the opener, then the main show,’ Tooth replied, already reaching for her light coat. ‘We should be able to get in before the main show starts at ten.’

‘Alright, then,’ Aster said. Tooth, at least, looked stoked about the whole thing, even if she wasn’t getting to take her datemate with her. Sandy looked intrigued, and Nick was game for anything, really, so long as they had a bar. ‘I’ll meet ye lot there?’

‘Don’t be late!’ Tooth chirped.

  
  


Aster was there first.

He’d said it the night before, and he’d meant it. He had a plan. He’d admit, it wasn’t his best thought-out plan, but then, he’d not seen many other options.

He’d been wrong, the night before, standing with Jack on the roof; he was not satisfied with not knowing. He could never  _ be _ satisfied, not if this was all he got, quick flashes of contact amidst thumping bass, there and gone by last call. He wanted more than this, insane as it was, little as he knew. He wanted Jack more than for an evening of drinks and bright lights.

He’d been wrong, and that meant he had to fix it, even if he had to scour  _ every damn nightclub in the city. _

Like he’d said - not the best thought-out plan, but it would work, eventually.

It had to.

This club was the first, and he’d get a list of clubs from Tooth later, ones like the few she had dragged him to. Queer-friendly, places that played music like the kind she seemed to favour. There couldn’t be  _ that _ many, not even in a city this size. There had to be a common thread.

He waited in the line, the bouncer scrutinising each person before she let them in; Tooth hadn’t been wrong, it was really going off. The wait had been nowhere near the same length at the other two.

‘You,’ the bouncer said in her lazy drawl, and Aster jolted. ‘Head on in.’

As he was the fourth in line, he was a bit bemused, but he nodded and passed the grumbling others without complaint. No skin off his nose if she wanted to make it easier on him.

The club itself was surprisingly - nice, Aster realised. It had the bouncing lights and thumping music he had grown used to, but it felt more open, more inviting. The dance floor was a bit sunken in the centre of the large room, leaving a wide strip around that housed the bar to Aster’s left and a number of tables to his right. In the back was the DJ booth, above the dance floor; there was a door at the front of it, and a walkway around the back. The bloke currently inside looked surprisingly bored, for someone who was at a club meant especially for music.

Maybe it was an aesthetic thing.

_ ‘Bunny?’ _

Aster jolted and turned - and there. God help him, a few feet away, was Jack, blue skinny jeans near the same colour as his eyes (though nowhere as luminous) and a shirt so pale it made his skin look like it had actual colour to it.

Jack was staring at him as though he hadn’t expected to ever see him again, which Aster thought was a bit rich; just which of them had  _ literally _ run off?

Jack stepped nearer, as if scared he was about to spook Aster, as if Aster was a wild animal that could scarper at any time. ‘I…’ Jack began, then faltered; he’d never been wordless in Aster’s company, and the change was jarring.

‘Ye?’ Aster prompted. If it came out gentler than it should have, Aster could hardly blame himself.

Jack opened his mouth to speak, but then the music began to fade, leaving nothing but the rumble of the crowd below, and his eyes widened.

‘You have to stay to last call,’ he said, snatching up Aster’s hand. ‘You  _ have  _ to.’

‘What?’ Aster sputtered.

‘Please, trust me, you  _ have to stay this time,’ _ Jack said.

‘Ye’re the one who -’

‘I know, and I’m sorry, but when I could look for you -’ and Aster warmed from the centre of his bones at that (Jack had looked for him?) ‘- you were gone, and please. Please, Aster, you have to stay this time.’

‘Jack…’

_ ‘Promise me.’ _

‘I promise,’ Aster murmured, just as the music died away completely; Jack looked so relieved, it was a bit shocking.

_ ‘Thank _ you,’ he said. Then, he lifted Aster’s hand, kissed the knuckles, and turned and ran off.

Aster stood there, stunned, for a long minute; he wasn’t sure what had just happened. He knew he heard the next DJ get introduced, heard the music start up again (was fairly certain he recognised Nina Simone again, come to think of it), but he didn’t  _ really _ register any of it.

‘Bunny, dear?’

Aster started as Tooth’s hand landed on his arm. ‘Sorry it took us so long,’ she sighed, ‘the line was awful, and the woman almost didn’t let Nick inside -’ she paused. ‘Bunny?’

‘He’s here,’ Aster said blankly, and Tooth sucked in a breath before expelling it in a vicious Hindi swear.

‘You are joking,’ Nick said, coming up on Aster’s other side.

‘Buckley’s chance,’ Aster replied. ‘He was here, and then he scarpered again.’

‘Did he say why?’ Tooth pressed.

‘No. He just made me promise I would stay until last call.’

‘Then we’re staying,’ Sandy said from behind him, quiet but so determined.

‘One way or another,’ Nick said, looking out on the dancefloor, ‘this ends tonight.’

‘Don’t make it sound so ominous,’ Aster muttered.

‘Come on,’ Tooth said, ignoring him. ‘We’re getting seats, and I’m ordering you a drink.’

‘Absolutely not,’ Aster huffed. ‘Ye’re not buying me a drink again for as long as we live, ye hear?’

‘You didn’t like the one I ordered for you?’

‘No.’

‘You’re  _ lyyyying…’ _

They sat down at one of the tables, and though two of them would go off at a time to dance, they never once left Aster alone at the table. Not that it would have mattered; Aster watched the dancefloor closely, and though he saw two people with stunningly pale hair, he didn’t see any white.

Jack had disappeared as utterly as if he was no more than a ghost.

He tapped his fingers to the music. The differences between this and the few moments of the opening act he’d heard were as numerous as the stars. The music he’d heard when he’d first come through the door was harshly electronic, sound effects utilised as instruments and harmonies too thick to be parsed. He didn’t know much about this sort of thing, but he knew what he liked and what he didn’t, and the first DJ’s style wasn’t within cooee of anything he’d willingly listen to.

This, though. This was music along the lines of the sort that he’d heard all weekend, the soundtrack to some of the most confusing days in his life, but it was good. He could hear actual  _ instruments _ in this, for all that they were manipulated and remade; there were human voices, sampled from all over the place; there were melodies and harmonies and complex basslines that could shake the walls but never drowned out the whole.

It wasn’t bad, so far as club music went.

‘You like it?’ Tooth asked as the night wore on; it was evidently her turn on watch duty. Aster had to admit to not paying very much attention, lost in his head as he was.

‘Could be worse,’ he shrugged. ‘I like it well enough.’

‘They’re my favourite DJ, so I’m glad,’ Tooth said with a smile. ‘New to the game - only been in the area six months, or so, but they’re very good, I think. Some DJs have to wait  _ years _ for an opportunity like this.’

‘Ye know me,’ Aster replied, taking a sip of his soda (he’d at last convinced Tooth that one drink was all he was accepting tonight.) ‘Couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.’

‘Now, that’s not true,’ she said, putting her chin in her hand. ‘I remember you did perfectly fine, the one night we went for karaoke.’

Aster gave her a flat stare. ‘Tooth, we were banned from that bar.’

‘That was entirely Nick’s fault for breaking the table, not your singing.’

‘He only got onto the table to boo me.’

‘He has no sense of musical taste.’

Aster laughed despite himself, and Tooth grinned, happy.

As the lights began to dim and the night began to draw to a close, Aster began to grow nervous.

That was a lie. He’d been nervous all night, ever aware of the oncoming time, when he and Jack would finally - he wasn’t sure. Drag it all out into the open, he supposed. Whatever Jack’s game was, whatever this all meant to him, what they would do next. If they would.

Aster didn’t fool himself - he knew what this was. They’d met at a club, rooted around at a club, they’d only known each other two days (three, now). He knew there was every chance that Jack would say it had been a bit of fun, but that was all.

If there was a chance, though. The smallest chance that Jack would be open to seeing him elsewhere, somewhere outside the club scene… Aster was willing to risk it.

He’d been cowardly, the night before. He’d not repeat the mistake.

‘Are you ready?’ Nick asked as Tooth and Sandy returned. ‘Is almost time, you know.’

‘As ready as I can be, I reckon,’ Aster said, and finished his drink. The music was fading, a little earlier than Aster thought it should; he looked over towards the dancefloor, and frowned. ‘Why’re the shades pulled in the booth?’ Aster asked absently, trying to distract his nerves. ‘If this is such a big deal for them, ye’d think they’d want to show off.’

‘Oh, that’s actually part of the appeal,’ Tooth said, waving her hand cheerfully. ‘Most DJs have a little schtick or something - DJ SpinnuhMan plays at least one gospel remix at every show, and this other DJ, Cherry, wears all pink. This one’s thing is that no one sees them. They’re either not in the booth or the booth’s shades are drawn; they never talk, either. It’s all very mysterious and exciting.’

‘Doesn’t sound like smart business, if no one can recognise ye,’ Aster pointed out.

‘True, but with this music, I don’t think they have to worry,’ Tooth returned.

Aster had to admit she had a point -

‘Good evening, ladies, gents, folks of neither, either persuasion.’

Tooth almost dropped her glass. ‘They’re  _ talking?’ _ she breathed, but Aster had stopped breathing entirely.

‘Maybe I should say good morning, it’s getting to be that time,’ and the crowd laughed. ‘Now, normally I wouldn’t do this, but I think it’s important to shake things up a bit sometimes, don’t you? Folks at the bar want me to tell you guys it’s last call, and I’ve got one last song for you all. Oh, and Bunny?’

Tooth and the others whipped around to stare at Aster, who felt paralysed.

‘This one’s for you.’

‘Oh my  _ god,’ _ Tooth said as the beat started up again and people began to move towards the bar to get the last drinks of the night. ‘He’s  _ DJ Frost?’ _

Aster wasn’t listening. He’d already gotten to his feet and started striding through the crowd, towards the DJ’s booth.

The front door opened, the music louder here than anywhere else in the club, and out walked Jack, smiling sheepishly down at Aster from the open platform. There was a faint cheer from behind Aster, but then he could barely hear it through the remix.

‘Jack,’ Aster mouthed, knowing full well he wouldn’t be able to hear him, ‘Get down here.’

‘What,’ Jack mouthed back. ‘You gonna catch me?’

Of course, because Jack was Jack, Aster was already ready when Jack hopped down, catching him around the waist and spinning a bit to disperse the momentum. And maybe, just a little, because he felt like his soul was soaring.

Jack’s arms were looped over his neck, and it was the easiest thing in the world to bend a bit and kiss him.

That only lasted a second, though, before a roar louder than the music broke them apart. It seemed half the club was cheering this time, Aster thought, dazed; then again, most of them were blind-drunk, so it was no wonder.

He looked back at Jack, who had gone a brilliant red but hadn’t stepped back from him, and smiled, a bit mortified. ‘I, er, could have maybe timed that better,’ he confessed, only loud enough to be heard because they stood so close together.

‘You think?’ Jack said, still red. ‘God, Roo,  _ I’m at work.’ _

‘Weren’t ye at work last night?’

Somehow, miraculously, Jack went redder. ‘Okay, look,’ he started, then groaned. ‘Wait, shit, the song’s gonna end soon. Let me close up,  _ do not leave,  _ and then we’ll talk, okay?’

‘I’m not going anywhere,’ Aster said thoughtlessly, then felt his face go hot; his skin was too dark to show it, but Jack grinned anyway.

‘Good, because I’d kick your ass.’

Aster let him go and Jack darted away, through a door cleverly hidden in the wall beside the booth; likely how he got in and out, and the platform above was for performers or announcements. Frankly, Aster didn’t much care. He felt like he was floating.

‘So,’ he heard from behind him, Nick not even having to raise his voice to be heard, and he groaned. ‘I take that is infamous Jack, da?’

He’d actually managed to forget the others were not only here, but in full view.

He turned, and groaned again; the three of them were wearing identical grins, wide and smug and  _ insufferable. _ ‘Don’t,’ he said, not quite loud enough to be heard; annoyed with himself, he quickly signed,  _ don’t start. _

Tooth and Nick had never been anywhere near as good as Aster, much less near Sandy’s fluency, but it couldn’t be hard to tell what he meant, if his expression was as murderous as he felt.

Sandy just grinned cheekily and signed back,

_ It’s a good thing you took your own car tonight, huh? _

Aster’s jaw dropped, and Tooth immediately began pestering Sandy for the translation.

‘Come, you can tell us story while you wait,’ Nick said, clapping Aster on the shoulder and making it clear that it wasn’t a request.

Aster sighed and let them lead him back to the table, where they could at least hear each other. He let their teasing chatter wash over him, responding with eyerolls and protests as he ought, but he was miles away and they all knew it.

The music faded at last, and the bouncer began to chivvy people out, working her way round to their table.

‘Sorry, folks, closing time,’ she said, barely giving them a glance.

‘We’re waiting on -’ Aster began, but she barrelled over him.

‘They’ll meet you outside. Time to go.’

‘It’ll only be a moment -’ Tooth tried.

‘Now,’ the bouncer insisted, beginning to sound annoyed.

‘Sorry, sorry, they’re with me,’ Jack’s voice called out, and the bouncer turned to watch him make his way over, eyebrows raising. Then, she turned back, and actually looked at them all, before her gaze landed on Aster.

‘Oh,’ she said, sounding knowing. Aster ducked his head, mortified. ‘You should have said it was DJ Frost you were waiting for.’

Aster didn’t bother protesting that he’d tried to, just let Jack approach and the bouncer continue on.

‘Sorry, don’t mind her, she’s just doing her job,’ Jack said, sounding harried. He looked at the others, and to Aster’s surprise, seemed to - almost shrink back, a bit. He was nervous, Aster realised, so far from the confident man who’d eyed him up Thursday night. He added, ‘Uh, hi. Sorry about that.’

‘Is no trouble!’ Nick boomed. ‘So you are Jack! We have heard much about you, past few days.’

Aster watched as Jack coloured a bit, and just had to breathe for a moment. This was real. This was happening. Jack was no longer some phantom or figment or dream, he was a concrete being and Aster suddenly felt like he could handle anything, deal with all the ribbing in the world, if only to keep him.

‘Honestly, I didn’t think you were real,’ Tooth added cheerfully, making Jack’s expression turn confused. She held out a hand immediately afterward, adding to the confusion. ‘Priya Bharandi, but my friends call me Tooth,’ she said, smiling bright as the morning sun. ‘I’m a big fan, we’ve been following you all weekend.’

Aster and Jack froze at the exact same moment.

‘We’ve  _ what?’ _ Aster asked, turning in his seat to stare at her.

Tooth frowned. ‘I could have sworn I mentioned that,’ she mused. ‘That’s why I picked the clubs we went to - I just really liked the DJ.’

Jack had gone more pink, and Aster had no idea if he wanted to hug her or throw her out the window.

‘Um, thanks,’ Jack said, and finally managed to shake her hand. ‘That’s a big compliment, wow.’

Sandy caught Aster’s eye and signed,  _ want me to get us out of here? _

_ God, yes, _ Aster signed back; when he turned to Jack again, his blue, blue eyes were watching Aster’s hands curiously.

‘It is wonderful to meet you,’ Sandy said in his soft voice, ‘but it is late. Tooth, you have work tomorrow, yes?’

‘Not until -’ she started, then got it. ‘Ah, yes, you’re right. We’ll see you tomorrow, Aster!’ she stood, then paused.

‘No, don’t,’ Aster groaned.

‘Well, maybe not,’ she said, and winked, and started walking off.

Nick followed her, looking amused, and Sandy followed them both, giving Aster a little wave as he went. Aster and Jack held still until they’d gone through the door, then Jack gave a sigh of relief and took Tooth’s abandoned seat across from Aster, slumping down with his head buried in his arms.

‘Sorry about that,’ Aster said, genuinely sympathetic. ‘They can be a bit - much.’

Jack laughed, the sound a little hysterical. ‘Wait until you meet mine,’ he mumbled, then his entire body went tense.

Aster swallowed. ‘I reckon,’ he said slowly, hope like a sun in his chest, ‘that at least that meeting will go better.’

Jack’s head shot up, face red as anything, and Aster smiled, doing his best to be brave. It could’ve been a slip, could’ve been a joke, could’ve been any number of things; but honestly, Aster thought as he watched Jack’s eyes widen, he was willing to trust it hadn’t.

‘At least they won’t think I’m a stalker?’ Aster offered.

Jack mimicked a buzzer noise, beginning to smile back. ‘When you showed up the second night, Pippa was pretty sure you had to be.’

Aster filed away the name and its strange ring of familiarity for later, and offered a sheepish smile. ‘Tooth thought ye were a stalker at first, too.’

‘What?’ Jack said, blinking.  _ ‘You _ were the one showing up at my clubs!’

‘Ye were the one who knew me name before I told you,’ Aster replied, and Jack coloured again.

‘We should go,’ he said, standing up, and it was only the  _ we _ that kept Aster from panicking. ‘Kind of, uh, don’t want to have this talk in public.’

‘Alright,’ Aster said, standing as well. ‘Do ye want - where do ye -’

It was an awkward ten seconds of them staring at each other, until at last Jack grinned crookedly and said, ‘How forward is it to say your place?’

Aster took a breath. ‘Not particularly,’ he answered. ‘Since I’d prefer that.’

Jack’s eyes lit up, almost literally, and his grin grew more even. ‘I was going to catch a ride with a friend,’ he said, ‘but I can call him and tell him I’ve got other plans?’

Aster nodded mutely, and Jack fished a phone out of his pocket, dialling as if he had the number memorised from long use.

‘Jaime? Yeah, hi. Yeah, I know it’s late. I also know you’re at Pippa’s, so don’t even pretend you were asleep.’ Jack rolled his eyes at Aster, who bit his lip to keep from chuckling. ‘Yeah, just tell her she doesn’t have to come get me. I’ve got a different ride.’

Aster could hear the tinny shout, mostly because Jack had to pull it away from his ear or risk a ruptured eardrum.  _ ‘Don’t tell me you’re going home with the stalker guy!’ _

‘Actually,’ Jack said, laughing at whatever look was on Aster’s face, ‘turns out it was his friend stalking me. Who thought  _ I _ was the stalker.’

_ ‘Well, I mean -’  _ Jaime began, but Jack cut in.

‘It’s a long story, I’ll call you tomorrow.’

_ ‘You better, or I’m calling the police!’ _

‘Ugh, yes, mom,’ Jack replied, and hung up. He shrugged sheepishly at Aster. ‘He’s a bit of a drama queen.’

Aster just raised an eyebrow, and let it speak for itself.

‘Oh, shut up,’ Jack laughed, and reached out before pausing.

It had been easier, Aster knew, to do this when they were just someone they’d met at a club. It would be harder, going forward. But infinitely more wonderful.

He reached the rest of the distance and caught Jack’s hand. ‘Come on, I’m parked below,’ he said, and Jack’s smile could have blinded a man.

They didn’t quite make it to the car intact.

See, the problem was, elevators were little spaces. That forced them to stand near each other, of course. And with their hands tangled, it really was the easiest thing to reel Jack in, and from there -

‘Shit, the door,’ Jack said into Aster’s mouth as they hit the parking garage floor. Aster groaned, exasperated that they had to stop, and Jack laughed. ‘Come on, we’re almost to your car,’ he said, and led Aster out the elevator door, walking backwards. It was deserted, most folks having left already, and Aster had never been gladder to be alone with someone, because he couldn’t look particularly decent at the moment, shirt half untucked and some of his grey curls coming out of his ponytail.

He let Jack pull him a ways, then took the lead, guiding him to his car. Jack stumbled a bit, which pulled on Aster, and they thumped into the side of the car, Jack neatly pinned beneath him.

The way Jack said ‘Whoops?’, all cheek and mischief, told Aster that it hadn’t been an accident. Which, really, just meant he had to get his own back.

He slid his hands up Jack’s throat, tracing the lines of it, back until he was cradling Jack’s head in his palms. He tilted his head back and up, then kissed him, slow and moving, wet and intentional, tongue used to the best of his ability.

Jack  _ moaned,  _ like Aster was doing something far more intimate than a dirty kiss, and worked a knee between Aster’s thighs, setting his hands so far back on Aster’s hips it might as well be his ass, and pulled in.

Jack rolling up into him, tugging and pulling and making noise after soft noise, almost made Aster forget what he was doing. Before he lost himself utterly, he broke away, panting. Then, using every ounce of willpower he’d ever known, he stepped away.

‘What? No no no,’ Jack demanded, reaching for him. ‘Come back here, you asshole -’

‘Get in the car,’ Aster replied, and was a little stunned at how low his voice came out. Jack jolted, eyes glazing over a bit, and fumbled for the door handle.

Aster strode around the car and slid into his own seat, hooking his seat belt and starting the engine in almost one movement.

‘God, Aster,’ Jack said, and Aster turned his head to see him pressing his hand against his groin, hips rocking into the pressure.

Aster reached over and took Jack’s hand, lifting it away and ignoring his whine. ‘Believe ye me,’ he said, and the low voice had made a return, making Jack shiver. ‘Ye’ll be glad ye waited.’

Jack tilted his head back and panted. ‘You’re going to kill me,’ he breathed.

Aster rolled his eyes and pulled out of the parking space.

  
  


It was the longest drive Aster had ever made, and the clock said it had only taken twenty minutes from when they left the city proper. It had to be a lie, but then, Aster wasn’t really in the mood to question it.

He pulled into the driveway beside his house, and paused when he saw Jack staring. ‘What?’

‘You have an actual house? In the  _ city?’ _

‘Technically, this is a suburb, I think,’ Aster replied, shrugging as he killed the engine.

‘But, you have, like, a yard. And everything.’ Jack unhooked his seatbelt, and Aster was confused until Jack murmured, ‘I haven’t seen so much green in  _ months. _ Even the roof wasn’t like this.’

That was right, Jack was new to the city, wasn’t he? Aster remembered feeling the same after his first semester at uni, and had ended up buying so many potted plants his dorm room might well have been a jungle.

‘Where are you from?’ Aster asked, unhooking his own belt and opening his door.

‘Up the coast,’ Jack replied, getting out himself. ‘By a couple hundred miles. Washington has a lot more forest than here.’

Aster nodded. ‘Wait until ye see the garden, then.’

‘You have a garden.’

‘Ye act surprised,’ Aster replied, cocking an eyebrow. ‘Since ye seem to know a lot more about me than I know about ye.’

Jack winced. ‘I…’ he sighed. ‘It’s a long story.’

‘We’ve got time, I reckon.’

‘Do we?’ Jack returned, looking very serious for a moment, his gaze intent over the car roof. Aster knew precisely what he was asking.

‘Fair dinkum we do,’ Aster replied, walked around the car, and took Jack’s hand again. ‘Come on, let’s go in.’

Jack followed him, the first flash of that nervousness returning from when he’d stood in front of Aster’s friends in the club, revealed at last. Aster just squeezed his hand, the best comfort he could offer, and Jack relaxed a little.

The house was dark, as it ought be when her owner was gone, and Aster flicked on the foyer light as they entered. Jack was looking around, and Aster had a moment of insecurity - he liked his house just fine, but what if…? Then Jack began to grin, and Aster told himself he was being ridiculous.

‘You know, the hallways are pretty narrow,’ Jack said brightly, toeing off his tennis shoes besides Aster’s; Aster sort of liked the way that looked, two people’s shoes side by side. ‘Almost like a warren.’

It took Aster a moment, and then he groaned as Jack began laughing hysterically. ‘Ye’re going to make the worst puns, aren’t ye,’ he said, resigned.

‘You’ve kind of set yourself up for them, Bugs,’ Jack pointed out, and Aster hated that he was right. He sidled up to Aster, looking up at him, and then murmured softly, ‘You know, I’d love to see the garden. But I think there’s another room I’d like to see first.’

‘That,’ Aster said very firmly, pulse already jumping, ‘was awful. How anyone can take ye serious is beyond me.’

‘Well, maybe,’ Jack admitted with an obnoxious fluttering of his eyelashes, ‘but did it work?’

Aster stooped and kissed him, arms winding around his waist and dragging him in. Jack went willingly (well, enthusiastically, really) and hooked his arms over Aster’s neck. ‘Think you could carry me up the stairs?’ he said, the words moving over Aster’s lips.

‘I could,’ Aster replied gravely, ‘but I reckon I’d rather not drop ye, or fall over backwards. A broken neck would kill the mood.’

Jack laughed, breathy and warm where the sound entered Aster’s mouth, and god, Aster could probably pin him to the wall here and just - but, no. Jack had said bedroom (or implied it), so the bedroom it would be.

‘Well go on, then,’ Aster said.

‘Don’t you have to let me go?’ Jack asked, impish.

‘Could ask the same of ye.’

Jack released his hold around Aster’s neck, and gave him a pointed look. Aster let go of his waist, then gestured up the stairs.

‘Oh, I couldn’t,’ he said, mockingly polite. ‘I wouldn’t know where to go.’ He fluttered his eyelashes again, and it was so ridiculous Aster had to laugh. ‘Ow, Bun,’ Jack said, now mockingly offended. He clasped his hand to his chest. ‘Are my attempts at flirting so funny to you?’

‘Ye were doing just fine on Thursday,’ Aster replied, beginning to walk up the steps. Jack was a few long seconds in following, and Aster turned, curious, before realising Jack had hung back to watch his arse as he climbed.

‘Oh, just enjoying the view,’ Jack said, grinning shamelessly.

Aster ducked his head, and Jack began to laugh yet again.

Jack was always laughing, Aster was realising, but not in a cruel way; his teasing was gentle, his smirks only more satisfied versions of his smiles. He was free and laughing and happy, so happy, and Aster ached to keep him that way, to preserve that kindly joy.

He reached the top of the steps and waited for Jack, who came bounding up now that Aster was done. Aster extended a hand, and Jack took it; Aster drew him in, then  _ moved,  _ turning and pinning him to the wall.

Jack looked up at him through hooded eyes, his smile small but no less genuine, and reached up, sinking his hands into Aster’s hair. ‘You and walls,’ he murmured.

‘Ye started it,’ Aster replied, ducking his head down but not kissing him yet. ‘Weren’t a thing for me until ye made them.’

Jack laughed, and Aster felt the shape of it on his lips, kissed him until he was gasping, then very intentionally bent down and hooked his hands under Jack’s thighs.

It was almost as if they’d coordinated it, a beautifully fluid movement in which Jack jumped and Aster lifted, and Jack moaned, shifting back and forth, rubbing his hard cock against Aster’s. ‘Goddamn, tell me you’re going to,’ Jack breathed, and whined when Aster shifted grips, pressing them tighter together by moving his hold to Jack’s ass.

‘Not tonight,’ Aster replied, and the disappointed noise Jack made was gorgeous, deep in his throat and heartfelt. ‘Not like this,’ Aster added, and that got Jack’s attention.

‘Like how, then?’ he asked, and dropped a kiss on Aster’s mouth, his cheek, his chin and his nose. His upper lip, centred on the old scar.

‘On me bed,’ Aster answered, low voice almost silent. ‘However ye want. But it’ll take too long to do it like this, Jacko, ye know it would -’

Jack nodded, even as he rocked his hips more insistently against Aster’s. ‘Okay, but soon?’

‘God, as soon as I have the patience for it,’ Aster promised fervently, and Jack moaned as Aster kissed his throat.

Aster knew this house like he’d lived in it since childhood, though it had only been five or so years; he nudged open the bedroom door that never properly latched, and stepped into the dim light of the room. It had more windows than most any other room in the house, and the streetlamps outside cast soft orange shadows on the walls through the curtains.

He set a knee on the bed and Jack let go of him, landing with a little bounce on the mattress. His hands came forward and cupped Aster’s jaw, the touch gentle and - Aster would say loving, but it was too soon for that, must be. People didn’t fall in love in three days.

‘Do you want to get the lights?’ Jack murmured. ‘Or is this good?’

‘She’s apples, Jacko, don’t worry,’ Aster murmured back. Jack leaned up and kissed him, and Aster let him lead him down, settle him over himself how he wanted. He seemed satisfied to have Aster all but laying on him, hips moving in tiny circles beneath Aster’s, and god, they were going to come like this if they didn’t change their tune, fully clothed and making out as if they didn’t know better.

Jack’s hands left Aster’s jaw and began to push at his button up, so Aster kissed him one last time and got up onto his knees, shucking both shirts in one go. Jack was right behind him, and in the blue light of night and the orange contrast from the streetlamps, he was stunning.

‘Ye and I still need to talk,’ Aster said, but he sort of undermined his own words by reaching out and beginning to undo Jack’s pants.

‘We will,’ Jack gasped, hips tilting up into Aster’s touch, ‘god, I promise we will, but I -’ his fingers were flying over Aster’s button and zipper, then Aster had to stand up and shuck off his pants entirely, Jack shoving his own down with shaking hands.

‘Are ye alright?’ Aster asked, eyeing them, trying not to stare at Jack as if he wanted to devour him. ‘If ye’re uncomfor-’

‘God, Aster,’ Jack moaned, his hips jerking up against thin air, his cock so hard it stood up and away from his body, ‘do I  _ look _ uncomfortable?’

Aster was dry-throated and wet-mouthed, hungry and aching and so full of want and need that he no longer was sure he knew what the difference was. He reached over to his nightstand and pulled out a condom and a small bottle of lube; he’d, perhaps, been a touch optimistic that afternoon (yesterday afternoon, now), but he’d never been happier to be proven right.

‘God, yes,’ Jack said, watching him. ‘Do you want - or do you want me to -’

‘I’m good with either,’ Aster said. He’d never been one to limit his options in bed, at least when it came to any actual activity. ‘What do ye want? That’s what I want to do.’

Jack moaned again. ‘Fuck,’ he said thickly. ‘You’re going to kill me.’

‘Not if I can help it.’

Jack laughed. ‘Shut it, you pedantic asshole,’ he said, and drew Aster down, taking the condom and lube from his hands and setting them aside. ‘For right now, I want you to kiss me,’ he commanded. ‘Then, if you wouldn’t mind, it would be great if you could fuck me. Just, god, as deep as you can go, as hard, I just want you.’

Aster groaned helplessly in his throat, his hips stuttering forward, and they both hissed as Aster’s cock slid along Jack’s, the contact unexpected and stunning.

‘Okay, quick kiss,’ Jack amended breathlessly. ‘I’m not gonna last, Bunny, and I want you  _ in,  _ I want -’

Aster kissed him, brief, hard, not painful but insistent. Jack’s legs fell open between his, and when he pulled away Jack turned, reaching for the lube.

‘Next time, face to face,’ he panted, and then Aster watched as,  _ god help him, _ Jack turned and rose up on his knees, head slumped forward and resting on his folded forearms. ‘This time, god, just -’

Aster took the lube from Jack, then paused a second to roll the condom onto his cock, hips jerking helplessly as his hand smoothed it down. Then he poured some of the slick onto his fingers, and began to prepare Jack.

He was beautifully responsive, so far from shy or reserved; he let Aster know when Aster did something he liked, from breathy sighs to wrecked ‘Oh, god, _right there’_ s. Aster bit his lip just about raw, the sounds like a direct line to his cock, until Jack was fucking himself back onto Aster’s three fingers and gasping his name.

‘Please, Aster,’ Jack said, and Aster could never have been strong enough to resist that.

He nudged Jack’s knees a little farther apart, to better fit his own between them, and carefully, slowly, entered him.

Or he would have, if Jack hadn’t pushed himself up on his hands and leaned back, rising up onto his knees, the length of his spine laid flat to Aster’s chest and his head resting on Aster’s shoulders, driving Aster’s cock deeper and faster than he would have dared just yet.

‘Oh,  _ god,’ _ Jack moaned, ‘God, do you have any idea what you  _ feel like  _ right now -’

Aster’s hands had settled on the ridges of Jack’s hips, his body making tiny jerking motions, grinding rather than thrusting; Jack didn’t mind in the slightest, judging from the way he just kept making noise, almost sobbing out his breath, hands clutching at Aster’s forearms.

‘Right there, please, just - right  _ there,  _ Aster -’

Aster could feel his orgasm approaching, sweeping up through his bones like the tide of the sea, and desperately he slid his hand down, wrapping his fingers around Jack’s cock and doing his level best to stroke evenly.

‘Oh, fuck,’ Jack cried out, and came with a whine so high it was silent.

His body clamped down around Aster’s, his body trembling, and Aster gave a low groan, managed to withdraw just enough for one actual thrust, and came with a rush that left his mind completely blank.

For one beautiful second, Jack lay against him, heaving breaths in perfect sync with his own, and then he slumped down to the bed in a boneless, graceful slouch. ‘God, yes,’ he breathed, and made a soft sound as Aster withdrew.

He tied off the condom and threw it in the wastebin beside his nightstand, then dropped beside Jack, the night air cool on his sweaty skin. Jack turned immediately and slung his arm over Aster’s waist, hauling himself over and laying his head on Aster’s shoulder.

They lay in silence for a while, breathing evening out, then Jack said, breath ghosting over Aster’s chest, ‘T’morrow. Promise we’ll talk t’morrow.’

‘I’ll hold ye to that,’ Aster replied, tired to the bone. ‘Sleep, love.’

He almost had time to regret saying that before Jack kissed his shoulder and said, in the bleary voice of the truly exhausted, ‘...ve you too.’ He promptly fell asleep, and Aster had just enough time to think  _ God, maybe three days  _ is _ enough,  _ before sleep claimed him, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue tomorrow (though all you smart cookies will have guessed _that.)_


	4. Sunday. (Epilogue.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://8tracks.com/proser132/sunday-slip-side

**** Aster woke slowly, feeling as if his muscles were liquid, his bones merely afterthoughts. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so rested, so at peace.

Sunlight was streaming in through the windows, occasional ribbons of bright light almost white on the walls; the light painted the insides of his eyelids vibrant orange. For most other people this would be a normal morning, but Aster’s windows faced west. It had to be at least one in the afternoon, if not later.

He was not alone in his bed. It wasn’t that he was unaware of this fact. He could feel the arms where they rested on him, his own arm curled over a back, the legs tangled with his own. It was only that he wasn’t aware of the  _ significance _ of it, for long moments, content in the reality of it before said reality made itself known.

Then he remembered. And blinked his eyes open.

Jack had pillowed his head on his arms, laying half on and half off Aster’s chest, eyes open but only by the slimmest margin. If he was awake, it was not entirely, and had not been for long.

‘Good morning,’ Aster murmured, the words less sound and more vibration, a quiet hush appropriate for the atmosphere they lay in.

Jack smiled slowly, the curve spreading up his lips, closing his eyes completely. ‘Funny,’ he murmured back in the same tone. ‘Your clock says it’s 2:17. Pretty sure that’s not morning anymore, Cottontail.’

‘It’s morning if that’s when ye wake up,’ Aster replied.

‘What, is this the morning glory version of  _ It’s Five O Clock Somewhere?’ _

Aster snorted, and Jack’s grin grew, and it was easy, so easy, to just turn a bit, catch Jack where he slid off Aster’s chest with an offended noise, and kiss him. It was the kind of kiss Aster was certain you weren’t supposed to share this early in... whatever they decided they were doing, morning breath and reluctance to be awake chased from notice by the brief press of lips.

‘Okay, yeah,’ Jack said when Aster pulled away, wriggling his arms around and almost elbowing Aster in the nose before getting into a comfortable position for them both. ‘Good morning.’

‘How long have ye been up?’

‘I’m not sure. A little while. Kind of fell back asleep.’

‘Did ye call yer friend so he doesn’t report ye missing?’

Jack’s eyes widened, and abruptly Aster’s arms were empty and he was trying desperately to find his balance or risk toppling off his own damn bed.

‘Fuck, where is my phone, where is my  _ phone,’ _ Jack was muttering, snatching his pants off the floor and rifling through the pockets.

Aster wobbled dangerously then found his balance, saw Jack crouched on the floor stark naked and panicking, and gave in.

Jack’s head snapped up at Aster’s helpless laughter, scowling; Aster didn’t believe it for a second, though, because he could see Jack’s mouth twitching.

‘Oh, you think this is funny, huh?’ Jack demanded, standing up, phone in hand. Even the sight of Jack’s body shifting, muscles under the skin as lovely in banded sunlight as they had been in the darkness, wasn’t enough to curb Aster’s mirth. ‘He wasn’t kidding, I’ll have you know. He’ll report me kidnapped, and he knows your name, too, mister. Police at your door in such a nice neighbourhood,  _ imagine _ what the neighbours would say -’

‘Any stickybeak nosey enough will get a corker of a show,’ Aster gasped out when he could, between barks of laughter, ‘The police’ll show up at the door, and I’ll answer it starkers, and say -  _ well, if ye’re looking for him he’s upstairs, but reckon ye ought to let him pull on his pants first  _ -’

‘You wouldn’t,’ Jack said, but his mouth’s twitches were absolutely useless at hiding the grin that was there.

‘Bloody oath, I would,’ Aster shot back. ‘See if I don’t.’

Jack gave up and laughed too, flopping onto the bed beside Aster as though he belonged there, had always belonged there. ‘Okay, okay, shut up and let me call him,’ he said, already dialling.

He didn’t get a chance to say a word before a shout came down the line.

_ ‘Jackson Overland, I am going to call your mother!’ _

Jack winced. ‘God, Jaime, throw the middle name in there and you won’t have to, you’ll sound just like her,’ he complained into the phone.

_ ‘Are you alive? Are you okay? Tell me you’re at home, because I am not coming to pick you up so you don’t have to do the walk of shame -’ _

‘First of all, gotta have shame to do that walk, and that is literally the last thing I am feeling right now,’ Jack said, looking at Aster and waggling his eyebrows; Aster bit his lip to keep from laughing again. ‘Second off - what, do you think my first act as a ghost would be to call  _ you?  _ Course I’m alive, kidlet.’

_ ‘Do not fucking start with me, Jack, so help me god -’ _

‘And finally,’ Jack said, grinning wide as a jack-o-lantern, ‘I’m actually still literally in bed with him. Say hi, Jaime.’

_ ‘Put him on the phone,’ _ Jaime said immediately, and Jack and Aster traded startled looks.

‘Uh, I didn’t mean  _ that _ part literally -’

_ ‘Jack, put him on the phone or I’ll tell Emma that it was really you who stole her nail polish when she was thirteen -’ _

‘Ugh, fine,’ Jack said, rolling his eyes, and held the phone out to Aster. ‘Sorry about this, you can literally just say ‘fuck off’ and then hang up, he knows I’m alive,’ he added, looking sincerely apologetic.

Aster took the phone gingerly, then held it up to his ear. ‘Er,’ he started, then felt like an idiot. ‘Hello?’

_ ‘Hi. E. Aster Bunnymund, proprietor of Astereceae Flowers and Gifts?’ _

Aster started, then looked at Jack, who had flinched.

‘Yes, that would be me,’ Aster said slowly, bewildered. How…?

_ ‘Awesome. Hurt him and I’m burning your shop to the ground.’ _

The line clicked and went dead, and Aster was left staring at Jack, who was staring at the wall.

‘Jack?’ He asked at last, tentative.

Jack sighed, then sat up. ‘Okay, story time,’ he said, voice so nervous it shook a little. Aster immediately reached for his hand, an automatic instinct, and Jack took it, gripping a little tighter than he perhaps would otherwise. ‘I’m gonna - try to get it out quick, god this is so embarrassing, and I won’t blame you if you toss me out -’

‘I’m not going to toss ye out,’ Aster said firmly.

Jack grimaced. ‘Well, just hold onto that thought, because you might change your mind. Just saying.’

Aster shook his head. ‘I’m really, really not.’

Jack nodded slowly, then sighed, and  _ then _ blurted out ‘I’ve kind of been into you for a few months now.’

Aster froze.

‘We, uh,’ Jack barrelled on, looking in every direction but Aster’s, ‘we met in January, but I’m not surprised you didn’t recognise or remember me - my hair was still brown, then, and it was only for a couple of minutes, I think. Half an hour, tops. I stopped in to buy flowers for my sister, her birthday was coming up. Snowdrops and -’

‘Snowdrops and white mums,’ Aster finished, stunned. ‘With a pink mum at the centre.’

Jack finally looked at him, agape. ‘You… remember?’

‘I remember the flowers,’ Aster admitted. ‘Always do, with special orders, in case of a return customer. I - remember ye, vaguely. I thought - ye had brown eyes, then?’

Jack winced. ‘I, uh,’ he said, and looked horribly embarrassed. ‘I kind of used to wear coloured contacts a lot. I dunno, it was a fashion thing, it was kind of fun -’

‘Are ye wearing them now?’

Jack shook his head. ‘Nah, I just used to rotate colours out. Like I said, it was fun - it would confuse people, you know? Pranks, that kind of thing. God, it sounds childish -’

‘Not really,’ Aster shrugged. ‘I mean, it sounds sort of strange, to me,’ he amended, when Jack gave him a look, ‘but then, fashion does that. Sounds like ye’ll get along with Tooth, she was doing the same thing few months back before she settled on the purple.’

Jack relaxed. ‘Yeah, it was just a fun fad,’ he shrugged. ‘So, um, we met, and I bought my flowers, and…’ he rubbed his eyes with the fingers of his free hand. ‘Okay, but you’re ridiculous, all right?’

‘What?’

‘With your looks and your  _ voice,  _ you were just -’ Jack shook his head and looked at Aster again. ‘So, um, I came back. With a friend. And then another friend wanted to see who I was sighing over, and it just kind of snowballed from there.’ He was pink. ‘So, I mean, guess your friend was right, I  _ was _ kind of stalking you. God, that’s creepy, I’m so sorry -’

‘It’s apples,’ Aster interrupted. ‘Just... can I have a mo’? I just need to think.’

‘Okay,’ Jack replied, and went to stand.

‘Wait, where are ye going?’ Aster asked, bewildered.

‘Um - you said you needed a minute?’ Jack answered, halfway standing and looking just as confused, and then Aster got it.

‘No, that’s not - Jack,’ he said, as seriously as he could, ‘I just spent the past three days chasing ye across the whole damn city, I don’t want ye to go.’

Jack sat back down, looking dazed.

They sat in silence for a bit, while Aster turned this over in his head.

‘...Pippa,’ he said after a moment.

‘What?’

‘There was a Pippa in me shop on Friday,’ he said slowly. ‘That’s where I remembered the name. And I thought I heard - ye were there?’

Jack had gone full red. ‘Yeeeeeaaaaaah,’ he said, the word drawn out. ‘I, uh. After Thursday night, I was going to say something. I went to the store, everyone insisted on coming with, and I - couldn’t make myself do it. I just wasn’t brave enough.’

Aster swept his thumb soothingly over Jack’s knuckles. ‘I had questions I should’ve asked that night,’ he said softly, ‘and I couldn’t bring meself to do it, either. It wasn’t just ye scared, Jacko.’

‘Then you were closed yesterday,’ Jack muttered, looking down at the bed covers. ‘I was going to come in Monday - every day, if I had to, until I was brave enough to say something.’

The feeling in Aster’s chest was rising, not quite love, not quite yet, but so close that he wondered if it even mattered. So fast, and yet so sure. He’d not thought something like this could actually happen, much less to someone like him.

‘I was going to go to every damn club in the city until I could find ye,’ Aster returned, and Jack looked up, eyes wide. ‘Every night, if needs must.’

‘They would have let you in,’ Jack said. ‘After Friday, I thought - god, twice in a row, maybe I was lucky enough - and so I told the bouncer that if she saw you to let you pass, you were with me.’

Aster let go of Jack’s hand, tracing his fingers up Jack’s arm, over his shoulder, cupping the back of his neck; Jack’s breathing sped up.

‘If ye’re amenable,’ he began, smiling as bravely as he knew how, ‘I’d like to give this a proper burl.’

‘English, please,’ Jack answered, mouth quirking but not quite into a grin. ‘Your accent is great, but I’m not fluent, yet.’

‘Would ye like,’ he said, leaning in a bit, Jack doing the same, ‘to get dinner with me tonight? Yer pick.’

‘I’ll have to go home, change into something else,’ Jack said, beginning to smile, a blazing look of happiness that sort of amazed Aster, that he had put it there.

‘We’ll stop there before.’

‘Oh?’ Jack tilted his head into Aster’s hold. ‘Dinner’s not for a few hours, though. Seems like there’s a bit of a gap in your schedule there, Mr. Bunnymund.’

Oh, that one was too easy. ‘I reckon, Mr. Overland,’ Aster murmured, ‘that I can find a way to fill it.’

Jack’s eyes lit up and he began to laugh, then leaned forward and kissed him.

It went from sweet to hungry in a second flat, Jack’s tongue sweeping out and into Aster’s mouth, and he was already moving, clambering across the bed and slinging his leg over Aster’s lap to straddle him, arms wrapping around his neck.

‘What if,’ Jack said, between short, burning kisses, ‘I told you I wanted - to order in, and just - stay here, instead of - having to leave?’

‘I’d say - ye still need to get clothes and things - can’t be comfortable to - wear those twice -’

‘That’s my favourite outfit. You took me home in that one.’

Aster reclined and dragged Jack with him, Jack on his knees above him and perched so carelessly, so gracefully.

‘Holy dooley, Jack,’ he breathed as Jack kissed down his jaw, mouthing at his throat. ‘Ye’re so -’

His hands ran everywhere he could reach on Jack, up and down his spine, over his arms, cupping his ass. When Aster’s hands landed there, Jack pressed back, a soft noise rising from his throat.

Aster was already blindingly hard, could feel Jack was the same way, the head of Jack’s cock trailing across his abdomen with every movement. Jack sat up and reached over to the nightstand, just within his range, and it shouldn’t have been so hot, the way Jack was already comfortable in Aster’s space, but god, Aster hadn’t wanted anyone this much since uni, if even then.

Jack fished out another condom and ripped it open, grabbing the bottle of lube from where it had nearly hidden itself under a fold of blanket, and Aster had no idea what he was going to do with them but was perfectly happy to see it through whatever Jack chose. Then Jack picked Aster’s cock up off his stomach, and the touch was enough to make Aster thrust up into the air helplessly.

‘Just a minute, come on,’ Jack was muttering, rolling the condom on with ease, slicking it up the same way, then lifting up on his knees over Aster’s hips.

‘Wait -’ Aster said, startled, starting to sit up. ‘Let me just -’

Jack’s hand landed in the middle of Aster’s chest and  _ shoved,  _ laying him flat on his back. Aster stared up at him, stunned, and tried his level best not to just - he wasn’t even sure the noise he wanted to make, just knew it would be awful and embarrassing. ‘I know exactly what you are going to do,’ Jack panted, his weight keeping Aster in place, ‘and believe me, after last night, it is  _ not _ necessary.’

Then, god help him, Aster felt Jack set his cock against him and just  _ sink down. _

Aster groaned and bucked up, Jack moaned and pushed down, and in a matter of a few seconds he was flat against Aster’s hips, curled over him and panting like he was running a marathon.

‘Are ye - are ye alright, god -’ Aster demanded, hands gripping Jack’s waist. God, that couldn’t have been comfortable, no matter what he said; it was difficult, but Aster kept his hips utterly still.

Jack lifted his head, and his eyes were glazed over, his lips parted. His tongue wet his lips and Aster swallowed. ‘Am I alright, he asks,’ he said, the words a little hazy but the sentence coherent. ‘Am I alright, like this isn’t - god,  _ Aster,  _ please, I -’ he rolled his hips, grinding down on Aster’s cock, and lost his words for a moment, from the way his voice trailed off into a whine. ‘I have never felt better in my  _ life,  _ and you ask if I’m alright?’

‘But -’

‘Trust me,’ Jack said, and leaned forward to place a kiss on Aster’s mouth, ‘a little stretch isn’t going to hurt me. God, you feel good, sorry if you wanted me to -’

‘Ye’re fine,’ Aster said, hips finally getting the better of him and jerking up, and Jack moaned again.

He rose up on his knees, possibly intending to do most of the work himself, and so Aster set his hands on his waist and dragged him back down, thrusting up with his hips. Then, before the noise could finish leaving Jack’s lips, Aster rolled them and pinned Jack to the bed with his weight.

‘Sorry, Jacko,’ he said to Jack’s wide eyes, ‘But I’ve got ideas of me own.’

He withdrew from Jack’s body, who whined desperately, but the noise changed when Aster gripped his thigh and lifted, became eager.

A bit of awkward shuffling later, and Aster was guiding himself back in, Jack’s legs over his shoulders and Jack almost bent in half against the bed. From the sounds Jack was making, no longer understandable as words, Aster took it that he didn’t mind.

He took his time on purpose, slow and even rolls of his hips, because he had some idea of how Jack worked now, a passionate, racing tumble towards orgasm. There were other ways, though  _ (god, especially with him, look at him he could probably go for hours) _ and Aster looked forward to finding them all, but for now, he could go slow.

Jack canted up against him, shyness no longer even a word in his vocabulary, body rocking back as best it could, hands tight around Aster’s biceps and likely to leave bruises. ‘God, Aster,’ he kept saying, ‘God, just  _ there,  _ a little faster,  _ please  _ -’

Aster would follow directions for harder, for deeper, but every time Jack said the word  _ faster _ he would reply, ‘not yet, Jack.’

Time was hard to keep track of, thrusts no longer counted, and when Jack reached for his own cock Aster pinned his wrists to the bed beneath his hands. Jack’s thighs trembled, his knees locked up, and with a low thrumming cry he came, entire body shuddering.

Which was when Aster finally picked up the pace.

Jack cried out again, over-sensitised, and Aster let go of his wrists to hold his hips, all but slamming into them. Jack’s hands came up to tangle in Aster’s hair, legs crossed behind his shoulders, his body neatly folded and remarkably flexible, and he began to whisper, ‘Come on, Bunny, just like that, just like that, God, you’re good, you feel like - everything, everything good, come on, I want you to, I’m right here, god,  _ please _ -’

Aster came with a cry of his own, hips twitching in and out, a rapid crescendo that finally slowed and stopped entirely.

Jack’s legs rolled off Aster’s shoulders and thumped onto the bed, his upper half relaxing back onto the pillows. ‘Goddamn, I should have said something months ago,’ he panted as Aster pulled out and removed the condom. ‘We could have been doing this for ages.’

Aster leaned down and kissed his shoulder, tossing the condom before laying down beside him. ‘I wish ye had,’ Aster replied, his own breath ragged. ‘But I’m glad I met ye at all.’

Jack rolled over and kissed him back. ‘God, we’re filthy,’ he muttered.

‘I’ve got a shower,’ Aster answered, nudging Jack’s nose with his own. ‘Give me - christ, twenty minutes at least.’

‘I’m going to need a lot longer than that,’ Jack admitted. ‘Might not be able to walk for a few hours, actually.’

‘That’s yer fault.’

‘Totally worth it.’

Aster chuckled. ‘I think ye said something about ordering in? I know a good Cantonese place.’

Jack’s eyes shone at him. ‘I think,’ he said, pillowing his head on Aster’s shoulder, ‘that would be awesome.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay enough cheeky notes, actual update
> 
> so I got my LNA certification (WOO) but still looking for work (BOO). I famously cease functioning entirely during the summer, so that's why I've been silent - writer's block is two bitches in a trenchcoat masquerading as a taller bitch.
> 
> The final part of It Tolls For Thee will be up in parts sooner rather than later, and there are numerous other projects that are slowly (SLOWLY) seeing the light. So expect something closer to last year's explosion of posting in autumn rather than the absolute drought you lovely people just went through.
> 
> Thank you for your patience, and thank you for your lovely comments! I see all of them, even if I only respond to the ones with queries, and it genuinely makes my goddamn day, no matter how small. I love you all, and I'll see you soon. (long novel of a note over)


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